THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 


BEQUEST 

OF 

ANITA  D.  S.  BLAKE 


/< 


THOUGHTS. 


MEDITATIONS  OF  A   PARISH 
PRIEST 


THOUGHTS. 

BY 

JOSEPH   ROUX. 

Introduction  by  Paul  Marieton. 


TRANSLATED  FROM   THE    THIRD   FRENCH 
EDITION  BY 

ISABEL  F.  HAPGOOD. 


NEW  YORK : 
THOMAS  Y.  CROWELL  &  CO., 

No.  13  Astor  Place. 


Copyright, 
By  Thomas  Y.  Crowell  &  Q). 


GIFT 


Typography  by  J.  S.  Cashing  &>  Co.,  Boston. 


CONTENTS. 


PC 34ok 
"RcP4^ 


Introduction  by  Paul  Marieton 
Prelude  by  the  Author 
I.  Literature,  Poets. 
II.  Eloquence,  Orators 

III.  History,  Historians 

IV.  Mind,  Talent,  Character 
V.  Joy,  Suffering,  Fortune  . 

VI.  Time,  Life,  Death,  The  Future 
VII.  The  Family,  Childhood,  Old  Age 
VIII.  The  Country,  The  Peasant 
IX.  Love,  Friendship,  Friends  . 
X.  God,  Religion        .... 


PAGE 

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109 

117 

122 

168 

181 


485 


INTRODUCTION. 


Several  years  ago,  when  I  began  my  felib- 
rian  studies,  I  observed  in  the  Review  of  the 
Romance  Languages,  two  or  three  little  cha7i- 
sons  de  geste  (heroic  songs),  by  a  Limousin 
author,  who  was  unknown  to  me,  the  Abbe* 
Joseph  Roux. ,  I  wrote  to  him ;  a  correspond- 
ence sprang  up  between  us,  and  th^  pleasure 
which  I  soon  enjoyed  in  my  intercourse  with 
my  new  friend  suggested  to  me  the  idea  of 
allowing  others  to  participate  in  it. 

I  had,  in  fact,  discovered  in  the  Abbe"  Roux, 
not  only  the  Limousin  poet  whom  I  had  set  out 
to  seek,  but  a  remarkable  French  writer  and 
almost  a  polygraph. 

I  shall  never  forget  the  feeling  of  surprise 
which  I  experienced  when  I  came  to  examine 
for  the  first  time  the  voluminous  pile  of  his 
manuscripts,  when  it  was,  with  me,  only  a  ques- 
tion of  a  note  upon  a  poet. 

In  the  presence  of  these  large  pages,  all  cov- 
ered with  an  astonishing  lapidary  writing  which 
would    delight   graphologists,    but   which   were 


iv  THOUGHTS. 

very  unequal,  to  tell  the  truth,  and  in  all  tones, 
I  perceived  the  possibility  of  many  volumes  of 
Complete  Works  for  this  man  of  fifty  who  had 
as  yet  published  nothing. 

Great  was  destined  to  be  the  surprise  of  his 
fellow-countrymen,  and  he  himself  could  not 
have  foreseen  the  whole  extent  of  his  good  for- 
tune, for  the  learned  men  of  Germany,  after 
outbidding  each  other  in  advance,  began  to  edit 
his  philological  works  for  him.  ...  It  is  a  pro- 
found truth  that  no  one  is  a  prophet  in  his  own 
country.  Superior  minds  are  like  stars  which 
may  disappear  from  our  horizon  without  a  single 
ray  of  their  light  having  reached  us. 

My  first  care  was  to  carry  out  my  project  of  a 
biography,  the  Limousin  Fe'libre1  (March,  1883), 
which  was  destined,  in  fact,  to  assign  him  to  a  high 
position  in  the  Provencal  Revival  a  few  months 
later.  This  circumstance,  and  the  publication 
of  a  portion  of  his  French  studies  which  I 
effected  in  the  Revue  Lyonnaise  and  the  Revue 
du  monde  latin,  have  made  the  name  of  the  Abbe" 
Roux  widely  known  among  the  lettered  men  of 
the  South.  It  is  upon  this  score  that  I  have  per- 
mitted myself  to  write  this  introduction  to  his 
work,  in  the  form  of  a  familiar  conversation. 

1  The  Fdlibres  compose  a  society  for  the  revival  and 
production  of  Provencal  literature.  Frdddric  Mistral  is  the 
chief  ornament  of  the  society. 


INTR  OD  UCTION. 


Born  at  Tulle,  in  1834,  of  a  humble  and  num- 
erous family,  of  which  he  was  the  last  child, 
Joseph  Roux  was  early  destined  to  the  priest- 
hood. Thus  his  youth  retains  from  the  toilsome 
mediocrity  of  his  first  surroundings  only  the 
worship  of  legends,  and  of  his  natal  manner  of 
speech.  This  worship  awakes  but  tardily  in 
him,  when  he  shows  himself  a  true  poet,  in  his 
native  tongue,  in  Limousin.  Up  to  that  time, 
that  is  to  say,  towards  his  fortieth  year,  the 
influence  of  his  classical  education  wholly  en- 
grosses him.  He  imitates  too  easily,  prefers 
the  grandiose  to  the  profound,  and  if  he  does 
not  watch  himself,  grows  solemn  without  cause, 
and  apropos  of  everything. 

The  first  essays  of  the  young  poet,  when  he 
had  but  just  quitted  the  seminary  of  Brive, 
were  noticed  by  his  bishop,  Monsigneur  Ber- 
taud.  That  illustrious  theologian,  perceiving  in 
him  possibly  a  future  light  of  the  Church,  left 
him  the  choice  of  his  own  position.  The  Abbe 
Roux  selected  teaching ;  but  an  excess  of  work 
caused  him  to  abandon  it,  .  .  .  in  order  to  pur- 
sue his  studies.  He  obtained  the  vicarship  of  a 
village  which  was  doubly  poetical  through  its  site 
and  its  memories, — Varetz,  the  cradle  of  the 
Grand  Master  Pierre  d'Aubusson,  —  and  there 


vi  THOUGHTS. 

he  continued  his  essays  in  versification  and  in 
prose.  I  shall  not  repeat  here  the  judgment 
which  I  have  elsewhere  pronounced  upon  the 
French  poems  of  the  Abbe  Roux.  I  regard 
them  as  scales  rather  than  as  music.  Never- 
theless, they  contain  real  pith,  as  do  also  his 
first  literary  articles,  and  some  of  his  maxim.es 
of  1866. 

.  Monsigneur  Bertaud  distinguished  him  in 
his  great  mind ;  certain  of  his  familiar  conver- 
sations with  the  young  vicar  of  Varetz  are  re- 
called at  the  episcopal  palace  in  Tulle :  "  Go, 
my  child ;  I  know  you  well ;  you  are  like  men 
of  genius,  you  have  great  faults  and  great 
qualities.  ..."  In  all  his  French  works  pub- 
lished before  the  Thoughts,  these  faults  predom- 
inate in  a  singular  degree.  The  replies  of  the 
Abbe  Roux,  who  with  difficulty  controlled  the 
sallies  of  his  powerful  wit,  are  also  remem- 
bered. .  .  .  But  it  was  a  good  epoch,  those  first 
years  of  country  life  !  Gradually  the  solitude 
became  oppressive  to  the  young  writer.  He 
exchanged  Varetz  for  the  benefice  of  Saint- 
Silvain,  a  little  parish  near  Tulle,  where  twelve 
years  of  melancholy  isolation  awaited  him. 

If  great  thoughts  come  from  the  heart,  the 
most  comforting  proceed  from  the  mind.  The 
Abb6  Roux  had  been  fortified  against  this 
necessity  of  a  village  priest,  by  a  solid  educa- 


INTRODUCTION.  vii 

tion.  It  can  be  readily  understood  what  a  re- 
source his  memory  was  to  him.  His  years  of 
study  had  been  well  employed  in  the  libraries. 
He  invariably  passed  his  days  of  vacation  there, 
amassing,  at  the  happy  age  when  impressions 
become  fixed,  all  the  treasure  which  he  was  to 
cause  to  fructify  in  the  future. 

At  Saint-Silvain,  where  he  wrote  more  French 
poems,  the  Abbe"  Roux  composed  his  first 
Thoughts,  and  also  the  first  fragments  of  his 
Chanson  limousine,  a  series  of  historical  fres- 
coes, a  sort  of  Limousin  Legend  of  the  Ages. 
Finally,  in  1876,  he  was  called  to  the  benefice 
of  Saint-Hilaire  le  Peyrou,  a  large  market  town 
of  Correze,  far  removed  from  all  centres,  where 
he  still  is. 

Thus,  for  twenty-five  years  since  his  depar- 
ture from  Brive,  this  noble  mind  has  been  pre- 
paring in  darkness  and  silence  a  work,  the 
reward  for  which  he  cannot  long  fail  to  reap. 
Two  circumstances  only,  two  dates  of  capital 
interest  in  the  history  of  his  humble  life,  have 
tempered  the  melancholy  of  this  renunciation 
by  their  real  utility :  a  tutorship  which  he  exer- 
cised for  six  months,  in  1870,  in  an  ancient 
family  in  Normandy,  which  relaxed  the  oppres- 
sion of  his  solitude,  and  permitted  him  to  catch 
a  glimpse  of  Paris,  and  precipitated  him  still 
more  deeply   into   his   literary   projects ;  next, 


Vlll  THOUGHTS. 

his  almost  providential  affiliation  with  the  work 
of  the  Fe'libres,  on  the  occasion  of  the  cen- 
tenary of  Petrarch,  in  1874,  which  we  will  not 
repeat  here. 

If  this  last  circumstance  was  certainly  a  boon 
to  the  Abbe"  Roux,  the  former  can  hardly  be 
regarded  in  that  light.  He  lost  at  the  Chartres 
railway  station  on  the  occasion  of  his  abrupt 
return,  in  1870,  six  note-books  of  his  Thoughts, 
—  his  entire  property,  —  which  he  has  only  re- 
placed in  part.  The  half  of  his  life  was  in 
them.  He  set  himself  courageously  at  the  task, 
but  I  cannot  affirm  that  the  new,  more  intimate, 
and  more  subjective  work  is  as  valuable  in  point 
of  poetry  and  freshness  of  impressions  as  the 
first,  which  has  forever  disappeared. 

Such  as  it  is  to-day,  such  as  it  will  appear 
consecutively,  the  Abbe  Roux's  work  will  com- 
prise four  distinct  volumes :  the  Thoughts,  the 
Chanson  lemouzina  (twenty-four  short  epic 
poems),  his  Studies  (country  and  literature),  and 
his  Poems,  a  Franco-Limousin  collection.  In 
this  introduction,  I  shall  consider  only  the 
Thoughts  and  the  Studies}  more  especially  the 
Thoughts. 

1  Many  fragments  which  figured  in  the  first  edition,  the 
Portraits  of  Peasants,  have  been  suppressed  in  the  present 
one  for  the  benefit  of  the  special  volume  of  Studies,  and 
replaced  by  freshly  written  Thoughts. 


INTR  OD  UCTION.  IX 

When  the  Abbe  Roux,  on  intrusting  me  with 
the  tolerably  bulky  and  as  yet  unexplored  manu- 
script of  this  book,  was  willing  to  defer  to  my 
judgment  in  the  selections  to  be  made  from 
it,  these  Thoughts  formed,  under  the  denomina- 
tion of  Maxims,  Studies,  and  Pictures,  the  often 
undigested  collection  of  all  the  author's  reflec- 
tions, coined  in  the  special  money  of  our  great 
moralists.  My  eliminations  were  numerous.  I 
have  been  reproached,  however,  —  although  the 
unanimous  success  which  welcomed  the  partial 
publication  which  I  have  made  of  them  has  been 
acknowledged, — with  having  retained  certain 
portions ;  but  is  it  not  more  interesting  to  have 
a  strong  literary  temperament  to  study,  with  all 
its  faults  and  its  beauties,  and  to  afford  a  deep 
insight  into  the  soul  ?  .  .  . 

The  first  Thoughts  were  written  with  the  view 
of  a  more  or  less  immediate  publication.  It 
was  only  on  perceiving  that  this  was  slow  in 
coming  that  the  author  gave  full  course  to  the 
unreserved  confidence  of  his  subjectiveness. 
His  finest  pages  are  the  echo  of  this.  As  in  the 
case  of  all  those  whose  minds  have  been  awak- 
ened by  a  classical  education,  the  least  carefully 
prepared  of  their  writings  will  be  the  most  dur- 
able. Compare  Voltaire's  little  verses  and  his 
Correspondence.  To  this  there  is  no  exception, 
except  for  those  who  have  been  gradually  de- 


X  THOUGHTS. 

livered  from  the  constraint  of  formulas  by  a 
whole  life  of  independence  or  adventure.  It  will 
be  understood  that  the  most  piquant  bits  in  the 
volume  —  like  the  two  biblical  strophes,  which 
Lamennais  might  have  signed  :  Obscure  germ, 
remain  beneath  the  earth.  .  .  .  I  will  be  a  flower ; 
I  must  be  a  flower  —  are  the  last-born  of  the 
thinker's  melancholy ;  but  at  the  same  time  it 
will  be  questioned  whether  the  poet  does  not 
decidedly  outweigh  the  prose-writer  in  his  case. 
The  reply  is  difficult  to  give ;  for,  outside  of  his 
entirely  special  work  as  a  medallion-maker  of 
Thoughts,  the  Abbe  Roux  rarely,  or  only  at  a 
very  late  date,  allowed  himself  an  opportunity 
of  moulding  his  prose  into  pieces  of  any  length. 
The  best  thing  to  do  is  to  assert  that  we  have 
in  him  a  penetrating  analyst  and  poet,  who 
complement  each  other  in  this  diary,  these  Con- 
fessions of  a  solitary. 

I  wished  to  view  for  myself  the  isolation  of 
my  friend,  and  one  fine  day  he  received  a  visit 
from  me  in  his  exile's  nest.  He  appeared  to  me 
like  the  Limousin  giant,  of  his  Geste  of  Charle- 
magne, with  his  strong,  square-built  form  and 
his  deep  bass  voice.  I  found  him  with  a  face 
large  and  lofty,  gentle  and  rugged,  — like  those 
English  lords  of  Henry  VIII.,  colossi  of  the 
North,  painted  by  Holbein, —  and  reflecting  a 
fund   of  almost   feminine   sensibility,  like   the 


INTRODUCTION.  XI 

accent  of  his  words.  With  the  gentleness  of  a 
child  and  a  poet,  he  exhibited  to  me  the  sim- 
plicity of  his  life,  and  I  departed  more  affected 
than  I  can  express.  .  .  . 

This  Bas-Limousin  is  a  very  distant  country. 
Missions  are  there  preached  in  patois,  as  will  be 
the  case  with  all  important  affairs  for  a  long 
time  to  come,  in  spite  of  all  that  can  be  done 
in  the  matter.  This  people  has  remained  hard 
and  uncultivated,  with  that  lack  of  cultivation 
of  which  certain  Thoughts  give  us  the  most 
exact  idea.  What,  then,  will  be  the  situation  of 
a  mind  brought  up  in  these  melancholy  sur- 
roundings ?  This  is  what  I  have  tried  to  explain 
in  my  Introduction. 


ii. 

I  am  led  to  speak  first  of  all  about  his  thoughts 
concerning  the  Peasants,  which  are  the  most  in- 
teresting probably,  the  most  original  certainly, 
of  the  whole  collection,  and  which  should  assure 
to  their  author  a  permanent  reputation. 

Their  accent  of  sadness,  their  tinge  of  bitter- 
ness, have  called  attention  to  them  first.  With- 
out being  precisely  the  harshest  of  all,  like  the 
intimate  cries,  the  thoughts  of  isolation,  still 
they  form  the  prelude  and  the  corollary  to  these. 
Therefore  we  will  begin  with  them. 


xii  THOUGHTS. 

In  spite  of  the  lusty  vigor  with  which  they 
overflow,  —  a  vigor  of  bitterness  and  vain  de- 
sires, —  all  this  portion  of  the  work  is  as  deso- 
late as  the  country  which  witnessed  its  birth. 
This  old  Limousin  seems  to  Wear  mourning  for 
its  glory  of  other  days.  I  shall  always  remem- 
ber the  long  desolation  which  extends  from  Cler- 
mont to  Tulle  along  the  whole  line  of  the  rail- 
way. The  consideration  of  this  gloomy  stretch 
rendered  my  friend's  solitude  all  the  more  keen. 
I  even  passed  a  night  at  Ussel,  a  small  his- 
torical city  which  is  not  wholly  characterless. 
But  what  a  flat  and  insipid  country !  .  .  .  A 
land  of  poets,  nevertheless,  and  of  melancholy, 
like  all  moorland  countries. 

Quite  the  reverse  of  La  Bruyere,  who  always 
retained  a  sweet  and  compassionate  recollection 
of  the  country  from  having  been  brought  up 
there,  the  Abbe  Roux  has  suffered,  having  only 
come  there  as  a  man.  .  .  .  He  would  not  say 
with  Joubert,  happy  man,  "It  pains  me  to  leave 
the  country  because  I  must  separate  from  my- 
self." These  soliloquies  with  one's  self  predis- 
pose to  evil-speaking.  But  "a  certain  sort  of 
evil-speaking  proceeds  from  love."  I  do  not  ob- 
ject to-that.  .  .  .  Thus,  from  the  day  when  the 
La  Bruyere  of  the  peasants  found  out  how  to 
strike  his  parcels  of  observations  into  medals, 
he  did  not  hesitate  to  take  possession  of  them. 


INTRODUCTION.  xill 

He  has  branded  with  a  red-hot  iron  both  their 
oddities  and  their  selfishness ;  he  has  exhibited 
the  qualities  of  their  natures  in  their  true  light ; 
he  has,  in  short,  established  in  a  superior  man- 
ner the  relations  of  the  peasant  to  the  country. 
This  picture  was  wanting  in  the  Museum  of 
French  Letters.1 

It  is  interesting  to  observe  how  a  priest  who 
feels  the  charm  of  nature  sets  forth  that  beauty, 
explains  its  seductions  in  order  chiefly  to  arrive 

1  In  spite  of  the  acclamations  which  have  hailed  its  ap- 
pearance, this  chapter  on  the  Peasant  has  been  generally 
misunderstood.  In  the  first  place,  a  sufficient  distinction 
has  not  been  made  between  the  curd  of  the  village,  the  min- 
ister of  the  God  of  charity,  and  the  observant  author  who 
understands  and,  through  a  tendency  common  to  moralists, 
generalizes  his  remarks.  Some  have  thus  thought  him 
pitiless,  others  severe  though  just ;  others  still  have  unex- 
pectedly arisen  to  reproach  him  for  the  temper  of  his 
criticisms.  .  .  . 

To  those  who,  like  Racine's  bourgeois  weeping  over 
Holofernes,  have  pitied  the  parishioners  of  Saint-Hilaire, 
beneath  the  author's  anonymous  peasants,  the  Abbe"  Roux 
replies  with  justice  that  all  peasants  do  not  belong  to  his 
parish.  To  others  —  to  those  who  do  not  concern  them- 
selves about  this  ill-understood  charity  —  he  repeats  that 
his  observations  are  made  in  good  faith,  with  equality  and 
justice,  within  Christian  limits,  and  are  worthy  of  a  priest 
who,  without  rancor,  without  wrath,  without  any  personal 
interest,  has  noted  down  here,  there,  and  everywhere  what 
he  has  seen  with  his  own  eyes,  and  only  what  he  has  seen. 


XIV  THOUGHTS, 

at  the  contrast  between  it  and  the  antipathetic 
homeliness  of  the  peasant.  When  I  say  that 
no  one  had  perceived  all  this,  I  make  a  mistake. 
A  powerful  writer,  Proudhon,  in  a  page  which 
the  Abbe"  Roux  has  doubtless  perused,  has  led 
us,  as  you  will  see,  to  the  confession  of  his 
brutal  pantheism. 

The  peasant  is  the  least  romantic,  the  least 
idealistic  of  men.  Immersed  in  reality,  he  is 
opposed  to  the  dilettante,  and  will  never  give 
thirty  sous  for  the  most  magnificent  picture  of 
a  landscape. 

"He  loves  nature  as  a  child  loves  its  nurse, 
being  less  occupied  by  her  charms,  to  a  sense  of 
which  he  is  not,  however,  a  stranger,  than  her 
fruitfulness. . .  .  The  peasant  loves  nature  for  her 
fertile  breasts,  for  the  life  with  which  she  over- 
flows. He  does  not  touch  her  lightly  with  the 
eye  of  an  artist ;  he  caresses  her  with  both  arms 
like  the  lover  in  the  Song  of  Songs :  Veni  et  in- 
ebriemnr  uberibus." 

He  has  recognized  the  fact  that  in  every  poet 
of  nature  there  is  a  pantheist  unconscious  at 
the  least.  The  most  religious,  in  the  evangeli- 
cal sense,  —  Mistral  and  Laprade,  for  example, 
—  insensibly  abandon  themselves  to  a  pagan 
intoxication  in  the  presence  of  the  larches  of 
Ventoux  or  the  oaks  of  Forez.  But  every  poet 
is  not   a   priest ;   and   the   priest   will   end   by 


INTRODUCTION.  XV 

so  thoroughly  repressing  this  pantheistic  senti- 
ment that  it  will  escape  from  him  in  the  presence 
of  nature. 

The  Abbe*  Roux  never  depicts  nature  for  her- 
self. Rarely  does  a  pleasing  description  temper 
the  harshness  of  his  observations.  At  the  most, 
it  is  only  the  rehabilitation  of  a  despised  plant 
or  animal  which  lightens  this  uniform  severity. 
The  moralist  never  shows  us  the  country  with- 
out showing  us  himself  there  also,  indifferent 
and  isolated. 

This  folk  of  the  Bas-Limousin,  coarse,  rough, 
and  heavy,  but  with  a  forcible  heaviness,  bears 
considerable  resemblance  in  point  of  the  dis- 
tance which  separates  it  from  the  great  cities, 
to  the  people  of  ancient  France,  whom  La  Fon- 
taine, La  Bruyere,  and  Sevigne"  observed  in  their 
wretchedness.  Its  native  vulgarity  is  common 
to  all  peasants  of  Central  France.  No  compari- 
son is  therefore  possible  between  it  and  the 
southern  paean}  who  is  acute,  ingenious,  clear- 
headed, and  with  whom  poetical  expression  is 
as  frequent  as  the  gayety  of  his  sun.  This  ex- 
plains some  of  the  objections  which  the  Proven- 
cals have  made  to  the  severity  of  the  Abbe* 
Roux  towards  the  peasants  whom  he  observes. 
Nevertheless,  he  has  his  poetry,  which  is  as 
wholesome  within  and  as  rough  without  as  the 

1  Rustic. 


XVI  THOUGHTS. 

fruit  of  the  chestnut-tree  which  is  so  abundant 
in  that  region.  The  proverbs  of  the  Bas-Lim- 
ousin  are  full  of  vividly  conceived  comparisons 
which  bear  witness  to  poetical  vigor.  Is  it  not 
here  that  arose  that  name  for  chimney-sweeps,  — 
winter-nightingales  ?  .  .  .  The  Abbe  Roux's 
rustic  studies,  the  shortest  of  which  only  will 
figure  in  the  Thoughts,  also  bear  witness  to  this 
rough  and  easy  forcefulness  of  the  Limousin 
temperament.  Jean  Rosier  is  an  example  in 
point.  Besides  containing  a  great  practical 
truth,  —  the  intelligence  of  which  has  allowed  so 
many  superior  organizations  to  go  astray  through 
force  of  habit,  the  abandonment  of  his  natal 
speech,  —  he  shows  us  a  local  physiognomy  in 
high  relief,  and  serves  as  a  pretext  for  the  exer- 
cise of  a  very  curious  style,  like  the  story  of 
Bourassou.  The  labored  phrases,  the  constant, 
at  times  painful,  effort,  the  original  research  for 
picturesque  words  and  for  conciseness,  that 
conjunction  of  Limousinisms  which  are  like  the 
color  of  his  genius,  are  certainly  so  many  proofs 
of  that  disuse  of  flowing  prose,  to  which  the 
author  has  subjected  himself  for  the  very  special 
exercise  of  coining  maxims. 

At  all  events,  the  Rustic  Studies  of  the  Abbe" 
Roux,  taken  from  the  life,  like  his  Characters, 
form  in  their  entirety  a  very  modern  and  very 
veracious  chapter  of   the  moral  history  of  our 


INTRODUCTION.  xvii 

provinces.  In  all  his  remarks  upon  country  life, 
the  author  does  not  always  feel  himself  bound 
to  form  a  conclusion — to  question  himself,  for 
instance,  after  the  manner  of  a  psychologist,  the 
why  of  the  peasant's  vulgar  exuberance  in  the 
presence  of  the  tranquil  and  starry  sky,  and  to 
make  subtle  replies  to  himself,  as  Amiel  has 
done,  shocked  by  this  contradiction  :  "  Why  ? 
Through  a  sad  and  secret  instinct ;  through  the 
need  of  consciously  recognizing  one's  own  spe- 
cialty as  an  individual,  of  asserting  one's  self,  of 
possessing  one's  self  exclusively,  egotistically, 
idolatrously,  of  opposing  one's  '  I  '  to  everything 
else,  by  setting  it  rudely  in  contrast  with  the 
nature  which  envelops  us,  with  the  poetry  which 
takes  us  from  ourselves,  with  the  harmony  which 
unites  us  to  others,  with  the  adoration  which  bears 
us  towards  God  .  .  ."  ;  still  less  to  form  a  conclu- 
sion in  which  he  recognizes  the  "rapid  vision 
from  the  absolute  side  of  the  personal  soul !  " 

No !  it  was  far  more  the  need  of  unbosoming 
himself  than  the  deliberate  design  of  writing  a 
moral  study,  which  guided  the  man  whom  we 
have  designated  as  the  La  Bruyere  of  the  Peas- 
ants. That  powerful  incentive,  a  literary  con- 
fession, has  led  him  to  examine  more  deeply 
into  this  point  than  any  one  else ;  that  is  all.  He 
has  brought  back  from  his  search  pages  which 
are  new  and  of  the  first  order. 


xviii  THOUGHTS. 

Contradictions  certainly  are  met  with  here  and 
there.  Is  not  contradiction  the  characteristic 
of  this  poor,  great  century  ?  But  we  have  there, 
if  not  a  study  at  all  times  equally  critical,  at  least 
a  great  page  from  a  moralist  which  will  endure. 

in. 

Does  it  follow  that,  because  the  Abbe  Roux 
has  studied  the  peasant  profoundly,  he  has  an 
eminently  critical  spirit,  and  that  he  will  bring 
the  same  penetrating  analysis  to  bear  upon  other 
subjects  less  tried  by  him  —  such  as  literature 
and  morals  ?  I  answer,  that  the  profundity  of  his 
views  upon  the  Peasant,  rests  upon  the  sincerity 
of  his  observation.  Now,  very  few  men  of  his 
calibre  have  been  found  in  a  position  so  hard  to 
endure.  However  critical,  then,  the  examination 
which  the  author  makes  of  the  divers  springs  of 
action  in  the  country  people,  the  novelty  of  this 
chapter  constitutes  its  greatest  interest. 

For  the  spirit  of  criticism,  in  the  modern  sense 
of  the  word,  is  not  the  dominant  note  of  these 
Thoughts.  In  the  literary  judgments  of  this 
book,  as  well  as  in  the  various  studies  which 
will  form  the  succeeding  collection,  there  will 
be  found  broad  statements,  a  picturesque  mode 
of  expression,  criticism  of  the  poet  or  of  words 
only,  in  the  fashion  of  Saint-Victor,  both  superb 
and  insufficient,  —  and  imagination  always.    But 


INTR  OD  UC  TION.  XIX 

in  all  this  a  profound  study  of  surroundings, 
causes,  processes  of  the  mind,  have  but  little 
or  no  place.  One  does  not  find  there,  for  in- 
stance, "  the  substantive  marrow "  of  a  Weiss 
or  a  Sarcey,  —  if  he  has  not  the  fine  judgment 
of  the  former,  he  has  at  least  the  extremely 
good  sense  of  the  other,  —  but  a  theme,  a  state- 
ment, both  classical  and  poetical,  of  the  remarks 
of  his  imagination,  over  which  hovers  something 
like  a  philosophy  of  history. 

IV. 

Up  to  this  point  we  have  permitted  a  glimpse 
of  the  influence  of  a  wholly  classical  education 
to  peep  through.  It  is  this  which  causes  him 
to  give  to  his  confessions  that  constrained,  cir- 
cumscribed form  which  make  of  them  a  book  of 
Thoughts.  For  I  might  well  be  accused  of  exag- 
gerating the  poetry  exhaled  by  this  soul,  by 
those  who,  unlike  myself,  have  not  yielded  to 
the  irrresistible  charm  in  his  letters,  in  his  pri- 
vate writings,  all  humid  with  melancholy  ;  like 
certain  English  poets  of  seraphism,  sensibility. 
If  that  classic  imprint,  which  will  appear  on  a 
first  perusal  of  his  book,  is  very  stable  in  the 
style  of  the  author,  it  varies  at  times  in  the  guid- 
ance of  his  judgment.  I  do  not  think  that  in 
general  he  preserves  sufficient  moderation.  Is 
this  saying  that  he  lacks  taste  ? .  .  .     I  have  in 


XX  THOUGHTS. 

my  memory  a  little  phrase  of  M.  Brunetiere,  apro- 
pos of  Galiani,  which  furnishes  me  with  an  ex- 
act reply :  "  He  has  not  that  discretion,  that 
moderation,  that  eloquence,  which  are  the  very 
foundation  of  the  French  mind.  .  .  ." 

In  fact,  this  powerful  mind,  which,  I  will  not 
hesitate  to  make  the  avowal,  like  Galiani,  would 
not  even  recoil  at  a  play  upon  words,  has  not  al- 
ways been  ballasted  with  a  useful  alloy.  As  for 
good  sense,  he  certainly  is  not  lacking  on  that 
point.  It  even  forms  a  part  of  his  force,  which 
is  also  composed  of  superb  and  biblical  imagery, 
of  irony  filled  with  spirit,  of  powerful  antitheses, 
and  which  wells  up  from  a  deep  foundation  of 
poetry. 

Let  us  take,  for  instance,  his  definitions  of 
authors,  in  two  strokes,  which  are  like  a  sequel 
to  Joubert.  In  these  he  shows  himself  charming 
and  striking.  That  which  is  ingenious  comes 
very  near  to  being  true,  thought  Joubert.  The 
Abbe"  Roux,  less  profound,  less  studied  in  his 
definitions,  is  more  spontaneous  and  more  poet- 
ical. "  Every  thought  should  be  a  little  like 
lightning,  rapid  and  luminous,"  M.  Jules  Cla- 
retie  has  somewhere  said,  "  and  the  more  of  this 
rapidity  and  electricity  it  has,  the  longer  —  unlike 
the  lightning  —  it  will  last." 

He  has  one  of  those  powerful  natures  like 
Veuillot's,   more   commanded,  perhaps,  by  the 


INTR  OD  UC  TION.  XX 1 

temperament  than  by  the  patience  of  genius,  — 
which  will  serve  as  an  excuse  for  his  faults  of 
taste.  But  this  poetry,  weighed  and  restrained 
by  the  example  of  his  models,  remains  classical 
by  fts  symmetry,  its  order,  and  its  clearness  of 
style. 

Here  and  there  in  this  style,  it  is  true,  will 
be  found  distant  echoes  of  La  Bruyere,  Lamen- 
nais,  of  Victor  Hugo,  even.  The  play  upon 
words  is  familiar  to  him,  as  we  have  seen ;  thus 
he  will  say,  "  I  have  been  inspired  by  gratitude, 
if  not  by  the  Graces.  ..."  But  this  style  is 
fine,  fine  with  force  and  with  poetry.  Anti- 
thesis is  likewise  familiar  to  him,  although  he 
reproaches  Victor  Hugo  with  abusing  it.  But 
the  antithesis  of  our  thinker  is  that  of  Pascal 
or  of  Saint  Augustine,  firm  and  harmonious. 
And  assuredly,  the  spirit  of  antithesis  is  a 
superb  gift,  just  as  genius  is.  .  .  . 

Apart  from  these  exuberances  which  consti- 
tute the  reverse  of  the  medal,  the  Abbe  Roux's 
style  is  strongly  original.  Nourished  with  clas- 
sic reminiscences,  filled  with  the  sap  of  the 
ancients,  with  the  marrow  of  the  lion,  he  avoids 
modern  liberties  of  phrase.  Better  than  that, 
his  style  is  lapidary,  like  his  handwriting,  large 
and  concise ;  and  all  variegated  as  it  is  with 
limousinisms,  as  I  have  already  said,  it  but 
draws   fresh   savor   from    that   fact.      But   the 


xxii  THOUGHTS. 

abuse  even  of  this  charm  constitutes  a  shock- 
ing defect.  I  have  mentioned  it  to  the  author. 
He  at  first  opposed  me,  and  not  unjustly,  with 
the  patavinisms  of  Titus  Livius,  which  were 
so  much  enjoyed  by  the  ancients,  but  then 
above  all,  with  my  eulogium  of  the  Limozisin 
felibre,  which  "would  condemn  me  without  ap- 
peal  " 

v. 

The  first  movement  of  the  author  in  all  the 
fresh  unconstraint  of  his  mind  will  be,  then,  a 
glance  cast  at  his  solitude.  He  has  become  ac- 
customed to  this  form  of  thoughts,  which  he 
already  manipulates  like  an  artist.  Now  a 
maxim  will  bud,  a  reflection  whose  all  is  brevity, 
as  a  sonnet  comes  to  Soulary,  for  example.  Un- 
der this  expression  of  the  state  of  his  soul,  as 
under  all  others  which  he  employs  concurrently, 
he  will  write  above  all  the  journal  of  a  solitary. 
In  fact,  his  real,  very  private,  and  unknown 
biography  is  in  his  letters  and  his  thoughts. 
Quite  the  contrary  of  La  Rochefoucauld,  of 
La  Bruyere,  and  of  Vauvenargues,  he  has  no 
fixed  plan  in  regard  to  the  arrangement  of  his 
book,  for  it  is  indeed  a  book  which  he  intends 
to  make  of  his  reflections,  but  he  unbosoms 
himself  freely  in  order  to  relieve  his  soul, 
merely  with  reference  to  the  subjects  which  he 


INTR  OD  UC  TION.  xxiii 

will  see  only  as  they  are  related  to  his  own  des- 
tiny. He  does  not  perceive,  this  virtuoso  of 
his  own  melancholy,  that  he  is  generally  only  a 
moralist  endowed  with  imagination  or  a  poet. 

If  Flaubert  was  not  wrong  in  writing  that 
"  Every  work  deserves  condemnation  in  which 
the  author  can  be  divined,"  then  this  one  is 
good  for  nothing  but  to  throw  in  the  fire.  I 
prefer  to  think  with  M.  Paul  Bourget,  that  no 
poetical  work  can  be  necessary  to  another  soul, 
if  it  has  not  first  been  necessary  to  our  own. 
Life  is  the  portion  of  that  one  of  our  works 
only  from  which  we  have  suffered  and  which 
has  healed  us.  And  without  even  speaking  of 
the  moral  benefit,  curiosity,  believe  me,  counts 
for  more  than  half  in  the  success  of  the  majority 
of  the  great  modern  works,  that  curiosity  which 
makes  us  seek  in  them  the  slightest  traces  of 
the  life  and  passions  of  the  author.  In  the 
work  of  the  Abbe"  Roux,  this  I,  so  hateful,  ac- 
cording to  Pascal's  maxim,  is  almost  always 
exposed  to  view.  Since  this  is  found  at  the 
root  of  all  psychology,  why  veil  it  with  tinsel 
which  criticism  will  tear  away  before  entering 
upon  the  subject?  .  .  .  The  contrary  excess  is 
equally  to  be  avoided.  If  one  makes  one's  self 
too  explicit,  leaving  nothing  to  the  investiga- 
tions of  the  analysts,  then  comes  along  a  reader 
who  undertakes  to  discover  something  more.  .  .  . 


xxiv  THOUGHTS. 

Our  thinker's  habitual  disposition  of  mind 
caused  him  once  to  write  to  me  :  "  111  of  long, 
profound,  accustomed,  possibly  incurable  sad- 
ness, I  am  your  invalid.  Scarron  called  himself 
the  Queen's  invalid ;  I  am  the  invalid  of  your 
heart,  and  your  cry,  'Hope!'  makes  me  smile  in 
a  melancholy  way,  —  me,  the  man  who  has  no 
longer,  through  fatigue  of  knowing  and  foresee- 
ing, even  a  gleam  of  illusion  as  to  that  future  of 
which  you  speak  to  me  so  generously." 

May  I  be  pardoned  for  this  quotation,  but  it 
seems  to  me  that  it  provides  needed  information 
as  to  the  state  of  morbid  sadness  which  solitude, 
aggravating  precarious  health,  breeds  in  the 
mind  of  our  friend.  It  has  been  remarked  else- 
where that  hypochondria  is  frequent  among 
moralists,  who  are  generally  valetudinarians. 
The  good  Joubert  alone,  perhaps,  in  spite  of  the 
suffering  which  accompanied  his  life,  has  allowed 
nothing  of  it  to  appear  in  his  work.  He  was 
happy  in  the  mediocrity  of  ambitions  which 
did  not  urge  him  to  trouble  himself  about  his 
Thoughts.  Hence  they  do  not  bear  the  imprint 
of  the  universal  law  which  says  to  the  genius  of 
men,  "Thou  shalt  bring  forth  in  pain." 

One  day  at  Paris,  Jos6phin  Soulary,  who  is  by 
nature  the  harshest  humorist  in  the  world,  was 
tasting  in  my  presence,  in  the  Revtie  Lyonnaise, 
where   they  appeared,   an   important   series   of 


INTR  OD  UC  TION.  xxv 

thoughts.  I  was  just  writing  to  the  author. 
"Tell  your  Abbe  Schoperhauer,"  said  Soulary 
to  me,  "that  I  enjoy  his  pessimism  and  his 
sombre  humor  very  much,  for  we  are  somewhat 
related  on  that  point."  I  wrote  down  the  poet's 
reflection,  and  we  began  to  discuss  the  affinity 
which  might  exist  between  these  two  melan* 
cholies.  The  thought  of  his  friend,  Chenavard, 
the  illustrious  conversationalist  who  will  be  met 
with  in  all  the  memoirs  of  the  century,  then 
occurred  to  Soulary,  and  he  was  obliged  to  agree 
with  me  that  if  there  are  in  the  world,  but  in 
directions  totally  opposed  to  each  other,  two, 
.  .  .  misanthropies  which  are  capable  of  com- 
parison, it  is  rather  those  of  the  great  panthe- 
ist painter  and  of  the  Abbe  Roux.  Soulary's 
philosophical  pre-occupation  does  not,  in  fact, 
exclude  a  certain  paganism  of  views,  a  certain 
sensual  indifference.  He  is,  indeed,  the  French 
Horace.  On  the  contrary,  the  purely  social 
preoccupation  of  Chenavard  implies  an  apostolic 
proselytism,  which  is  that  of  a  believer,  after 
his  own  fashion. 

The  Abbe  Roux  was  at  that  time  ignorant  of 
even  the  name  of  the  German  pessimist,  any 
resemblance  to  whom  was  repugnant  to  him  : 
"Novelties"  he  says,  "arrive  so  late  in  the  Bas- 
Limousin  !  "  It  was  not  what  would  make  him 
enjoy  them  more.     Pessimism,  in  all  its  forms,  is 


XXVi  THOUGHTS. 

nothing  but  an  intellectual  malady,  a  compliant 
and  privileged  malady ;  that  is  to  say,  it  is  acces- 
sible to  dilettanteism,  to  free  thought  alone. 

Nevertheless,  however  fixed  may  be  the  obses- 
sion of  our  solitary,  this  resigned  man  is  far 
from  judging  life  to  be  evil  in  itself,  of  even 
suspecting  the  essence  of  pessimism.  "  Oh,  if 
I  could  escape  the  pneumatic  machine  which 
envelopes  me,"  he  wrote  to  me,  "  how  I  would 
raise  my  heart  and  my  wings  on  high  ! "  This 
is  the  utmost,  if  he  shows  any  misanthropy,  re- 
sulting from  endless  disappointments  and  from 
illusions  which  have  flown,  each  in  turn.  .  .  . 
"But,"  he  replied  to  me  in  advance,  "no  one 
loves  the  good,  the  beautiful,  and  the  true,  more 
than  I  do  ;  no  one  desires  more  than  I  do  to 
render  some  one  happy,  or  to  know  that  one  is 
so !  .  .  .  Come,  Philintus,  remember  that  Alceste- 
Montausier  had  the  reputation  of  being  the  most 
virtuous  man  of  his  day." 

VI. 

Have  I  not,  up  to  this  point,  too  completely 
forgotten  the  priest  ?  .  .  .  He  who  has  gone 
directly  to  the  ThougJits  without  paying  any 
heed  to  this  preamble,  will  have  speedily  encoun- 
tered him.  As  in  Mme.  Swctchine's  drawing- 
room  one  felt  the  presence  of  the  chapel,  we 
perceive   in    frequenting    the    society   of    our 


INTRODUCTION.  xxvil 

thinker,  that  the  parish  church  is  close  at  hand. 
We  should  be  wrong  in  reproaching  him  for  it ; 
it  is  in  this  point,  above  all  others,  that  his  case 
is  interesting.  We  have  already  announced  him 
as  a  Limousin  Ftfibre,  an  almost  Spanish  mystic, 
a  Theresian,  if  I  may  put  it  so.  Certain  thoughts 
in  the  chapter,  "  God,  Theology,"  will  inform 
every  one  on  this  point.  This  comes  from 
his  property  of  Southerner,  of  poet,  and  from 
the  influences  of  his  sacerdotal  youth.  How 
that  education  weighs  upon  a  life !  The  time 
passed  in  the  seminary  weighs  upon  the  soul  of 
every  priest.  When  at  times  he  exclaims  or 
sermonizes,  do  not  seek  the  cause  elsewhere. 
You  have  seen  our  thinker,  in  spite  of  his  emi- 
nently classical  education,  arraign  Fenelon  him- 
self for  his  pagan  literature  !  But  the  poet  has  re- 
mained very  free  beneath  this  apparent  severity. 
These  Thoughts  are,  in  fact,  marked  by  a 
broad  liberty  of  spirit.  In  this  era  of  sceptical 
works,  we  are  generally  wrong  in  believing  that 
the  principle  of  authority  deprives  the  Church 
and  her  faithful  followers  of  all  freedom  of 
flight.  We  so  rarely  have  an  opportunity  to 
judge  an  author  who  affirms  a  well  settled  and 
definite  religious  idea  (instead  of  that  vague 
deism,  indifferent  to  all  the  rest,  which  only 
makes  its  appearance  in  the  good  parts  of 
books),    that    philosophical    thoughts    from    a 


XXV111  THOUGHTS. 

priest,  under  this  form,  and  endowed  with  this 
profound  interest,  falling  into  the  decaying  soci- 
ety which  surrounds  us,  will  possess  qualities  to 
greatly  amaze  us.  And  yet,  consider  :  there 
seems  to  be  a  return,  among  a  young  literary 
school,  to  the  refined  mysticism  of  certain 
epochs,  under  the  double  influence  of  Baude- 
laire and  M.  Barbey  d'Aurevilly.  But  this 
group,  which  easily  becomes  sensualistic,  will 
produce  pseudo-catholicism  rather  than  art 
which  is  healthily  Christian.  The  Abbe  Roux 
has  nothing  to  do  with  it.  A  work  may  be 
human,  actual,  true,  without  being  necessa- 
rily an  exposition  of  the  troubles  of  the  flesh 
or  of  the  crises  of  the  conscience.  Formerly, 
people  knew  how  to  search  for  interest  else- 
where. Modern  psychological  criticism  will  end, 
through  the  abuse  which  it  makes  of  physiol- 
ogy, by  taking  pleasure  in  the  examination  of 
intellectual  maladies  even  to  the  point  of  con- 
fining the  whole  of  art  and  nature  to  this ! 

As  for  knowing  —  and  the  question  has  been 
put  to  us  —  up  to  what  degree  this  work  will 
produce  a  favorable  impression,  we  cannot  under- 
take to  answer  in  a  word.  According  to  the 
judgment  of  a  literary  man  of  1885,  it  ought  to 
prove  an  event  on  account  of  the  depths  of 
human  nature  which  it  discloses.  Twenty  years 
ago,  the  presence  of  a  priest  behind  this  hymn 


INTRODUCTION.  XXIX 

of  suffering  would  have  called  forth  a  frown  ; 
to-day  it  evokes  a  glance  of  sympathy.  The 
truth,  the  naked  truth,  we  behold,  nothing  else. 
And  yet,  as  Amiel  said,  "how  few  original 
beings  there  are  who  are  individual  and  worth 
the  trouble  of  listening  to  !  " 

There  is  still  much  to  criticise  and  much  to 
praise  in  the  work  which  I  have  just  introduced. 
Nevertheless,  I  will  stop  my  observations  here. 
The  friendship  which  attaches  me  to  the  Abbe" 
Roux  is  now  too  absolute  to  allow  of  my  push- 
ing the  analysis  further  in  either  direction. 

I  only  ask  that  heed  may  be  paid  to  the 
strange  situation  of  the  author.  "  You  are  pub- 
lishing my  Thoughts"  he  wrote  to  me ;  "  take 
care.  I  am  not  sufficiently  independent  to  seek 
calumnies  ;  for  I  am  not  individual  but  legion, 
and  the  good  Abbe  Joseph  Roux  will  bear  the 
mountain  of  prejudices  which  weighs  upon  the 
clergy  at  all  periods,  and  especially  at  the  pres- 
ent one.  .  .  .  Prudence,  my  friend  !  You  would 
have  me  believe  that  I  am  about  to  become  a 
personage.  I  find  some  difficulty  in  hoping  it. 
I  shall  always  be  a  prisoner  immured  within 
walls.  With  a  character  both  proud  and  timid, 
one  never  comes  to  anything." 

Having  dared,  however,  he  was  then  obliged 
to  wait.  But  few  priests  are  capable  of  thus 
daring,  and  those  who  are  remain  isolated.     Do 


XXX  THOUGHTS. 

we  not  behold  these  terrible  errors  in  all  the 
administrations  of  the  world  ?  He  who  does 
more  than  his  task  lies  under  suspicion ;  he 
who  does  more  than  his  duty  is  ridiculous. 

The  Abb6  Roux  has  freed  himself  from  this 
universal  constraint.  The  dominant  note  of  his 
Thoughts  is  long  aspiration  in  long-continued 
powerlessness.  And  this  great  man  of  fifty 
who  has  published  nothing,  has  written,  in  a 
style  which  will  endure,  the  Christian  poem  of 
the  agonies  of  a  deserted  being. 

"  But  this  is  like  a  funeral  oration,"  you  will 
say  to  me.  It  is  not,  in  truth,  what  I  intended 
it  to   be.  .  .  . 

Think  rather,  friend  reader,  that  you  are 
present  at  a  birth,  and  that  you  have  assisted. 

PAUL  MARIETON.i 
March,  1885. 

1  M.  Paul  Maridton  is  alone  responsible  for  the  opin- 
ions expressed  in  this  preface. 


PRELUDE. 

THOUGHTS   AND   THINKERS. 

THE  AUTHOR  OF  THIS  BOOK. 

To  put  forth  thoughts  —  therein  lies  my  con- 
solation, my  delight,  my  life.  I  too  would  exclaim, 
in  another  sense,  "  I  think,  therefore  I  am  !  " 

* 

*  * 

A  maker  of  maxims  is  synonymous  with  a 
pessimist.     {Maximist,  pessimist.) 

* 

*  * 

"  Thoughts  "  are  fruits ;  words  are  leaves. 
Let  us  strip  off  the  leaves !  let  us  strip  off  the 
leaves  !  in  order  that  thought,  thus  exposed  to 
the  light,  may  gain  strength,  beauty,  and  flavor. 

* 

*  * 

O,  ye  who  pluck  these  "  thoughts,"  may  you, 
beneath  their  veil  of  verdure,  find  always  a  fra- 
grant flower,  a  savory  fruit ! 

* 

*  * 

A  monk  was  once  asked,  "  How  do  you  know 
the  world,  since  you  live  in  solitude  ? "  "  I 
study  it  in  myself,"  he  replied.      Thus  I  catch 


2  THOUGHTS. 

only  a  passing  glimpse  of  society,  but  I  observe 
attentively  the  little  which  I  see ;  then  I  reflect 
upon  it  frequently  and  at  length. 

* 
*  * 

Oh,  the  irksomeness  of  writing  alone,  of  cor- 
recting alone !  Who  listens  to  me,  who  coun- 
sels me,  who  encourages  me  ?  Virgil  compared 
himself  to  the  bear  licking  its  cubs  to  "  finish  " 
them.  Happy  Virgil,  who  worked  full  of  hope, 
midway  from  Rome,  beneath  august  eyes ! 
* 

Pascal  is  sombre,  La  Rochefoucauld  bitter, 
La  Bruyere  malicious,  Vauvenargues  melan- 
choly, Chamfort  acrimonious,  Joubert  benevo- 
lent, Swetchine  gentle. 

Pascal  seeks,  La  Rochefoucauld  suspects, 
La  Bruyere  spies,  Vauvenargues  sympathizes, 
Chamfort  condemns,  Joubert  excuses,  Swetchine 
mourns. 

Pascal  is  assailed  by  an  evil  spirit,  La  Roche- 
foucauld takes  sides,  La  Bruyere  has  a  point 
of  view,  Vauvenargues  possesses  toleration, 
Chamfort  a  grudge,  Joubert  an  aspiration, 
Swetchine   a  hope. 

Pascal  refers  everything  to  folly,  La  Roche- 
foucauld to  a  vice,  La  Bruyere  to  eccentricity, 
Vauvenargues  to  a  sentiment,  Chamfort  to  an 
abuse,  Joubert  to  an  ideal,  Swetchine  to  a  belief. 


PRELUDE. 


Pascal  is  profound,  La  Rochefoucauld  pene- 
trating, La  Bruyere  sagacious,  Vauvenargues 
delicate,  Chamfort  paradoxical,  Joubert  ingen- 
ious, Swetchine  contemplative. 


* 
*  * 


It  is  a  difficult  enterprise,  a  delicate  under- 
taking, to  write  "thoughts."  What  a  well-in- 
formed mind,  what  a  fertile  imagination,  what  a 
just  and  profound  feeling  of  things,  what  a  happy 
style,  is  requisite  to  attain  even  mediocrity 
therein ! 


* 
*  * 


Why  have  I  taken  such  a  burden  upon  my 
shoulders  ?  What  necessity  inclines  me  to  this 
task  ?  Alas !  the  mind  of  men  is  a  mystery ; 
and,  like  the  plant,  each  one  of  us  naturally 
appropriates  and  assimilates  that  about  him 
which  responds  to  that  which  is  within  him. 


* 


The  commentator  of  a  poet  habitually  inclines 
to  eulogy :  'tis  a  question  of  showing  that  one 
has  taste.  The  commentator  of  a  maxim-maker 
leans  towards  blame  :  'tis  a  question  of  showing 

that  one  has  judgment. 

* 
*  * 

Of  all  that  I  write  will  anything  survive,  and 
what  part  of  it  will  survive  ?  If  I  win  renown, 
to  what  shall  I  owe  it  ?     To  my  Great  Limousin 


THOUGHTS. 


Dictio7iary  ?  To  my  Limousin  Epic?  To  these 
Thoughts  ?  I  should  like  to  know,  but  how  can 
I  know  ?  Let  us  leave  to  the  future  its  secret, 
and  trust  in  God. 


* 
*  * 


"...  It  was  a  melancholy  humor,  produced  by 
the  chagrin  of  solitude,  which  first  put  this 
dream  of  meddling  with  writing  into  my  head ; 
and  then,  finding  myself  utterly  destitute  and 
void  of  any  other  matter,  I  took  myself  as  argu- 
ment and  subject."     (Essays,  Book  II.    Chap. 

VIII.) 

These  reasons  of  Montaigne  are  mine  also, 
with  the  difference  of  his  marvellous  intellect, 
his  high  position,  his  great  learning,  and  his 
rare  experience.  That  "chagrin  of  solitude," 
which  he  knew  during  a  part  of  his  life  only, 
has  been  my  travelling  companion  since  my 
youth.  Moreover,  the  Essays,  the  fruit  of  a 
melancholy  which  was  foreign  to  his  natural  dis- 
position, differ  greatly  from  my  rough  sketch, 
where  much  sadness  and  even  a  little  bitterness 
are  perceptible. 


I. 

LITERATURE,   POETS. 


Whoever  publishes  a  work  which  is  not 
mediocre  creates  for  himself  a  number  of  friends 
and  of  enemies,  either  known  or  unknown. 


ii. 


The  real  gives  exactness,  the  ideal  adds  the 
truth.  The  realist  reproduces  only  things,  the 
idealist  "  invents  "  beings. 


in. 


I  should  define  poetry  as  the  exquisite  ex- 
pression of  exquisite  impressions. 


IV. 


Poetry  is  always  all-powerful  over  souls  which 
have  not  become  cloyed. 


The  artist  being  spirit  and  flesh,  must  guard 
against  the  purely  ideal,  that  is  to  say,  against 


THOUGHTS. 


spirit  which  is  not  united  to  a  body ;  and  from 
the  purely  real,  that  is  to  say,  from  body  which 
is  not  united  to  a  spirit. 

VI. 

Great  souls  are  harmonious. 

VII. 

The  desert  attracts  the  nomad  ;  the  ocean,  the 
sailor  ;  the  infinite,  the  poet. 

VIII. 

What  a  beautiful  language  is  Latin  !  I  love  it. 
It  has  been  said  of  a  Latin  scholar,  that  he  spoke 
Latin  in  the  cradle.  I  learned  Latin  at  college, 
but  with  as  much  heart  as  though  it  had  been 
the  tongue  of  my  father  and  mother.  I  have  it 
not  in  my  memory ;  I  have  it  in  my  entrails,  so 
to  speak.  For  a  long  time  I  thought  in  Latin,  in 
order  to  speak  in  French.  More  than  that,  both 
my  prose  and  my  verse  swarm  with  latin  isms  to 
this  day.  Premeditated?  No,  but  they  have 
come  of  their  own  will. 

IX. 

Virgil  is  quoted,  and  with  reason  ;  Homer  is 
little  quoted,  and  this  is  wrong. 

Virgil  and  Homer  possess  family  traits ;  the 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  7 

same  blood  flows  in  the  veins  of  both,  it  is  true, 
but  Homer  begat  Virgil. 

How  Homer  pleases  me,  read  either  before  or 
after  Virgil,  with  his  loquacity  of  a  Greek,  his 
garrulity  of  an  old  man !  Virgil  is  more  the 
man,  Homer  more  the  poet.  Homer  takes 
entire  possession  of  the  entire  mind.  He  is  not 
the  voice  of  a  polished  age,  of  an  age  which  was 
unique ;  he  is  the  genius  of  the  centuries  of  old. 
There  are  above  Homer  and  his  sublime  chil- 
dren's stories,  only  Job  and  Moses,  those  incom- 
parable secretaries  of  the  true  God. 

The  people  of  our  colleges,  who  are  tolerably 
ignorant  of  the  language  of  sovereign  harmonies y 
should  have  spared  Homer  their  dithyrambic 
commentaries ;  woe  to  whosoever  complains  of 
it !  Monuments  should  not  be  built  about ; 
Homer  should  not  be  built  about.  Of  what  use 
are  the  house  and  the  men,  who,  viewed  from 
this  lofty  monument,  have  the  appearance  of  ant- 
heaps  and  ants  ? 

Homer  is  such  that  all  comparison,  far  from 
belittling  him,  renders  him  yet  greater. 


x. 

Homer  calls  the  sun  "  the  eye  and  the  ear  of 
the  world."  Granted,  so  far  as  the  "  eye  "  is 
concerned,  but  "  the  ear  "  —  what  has  the  ear  to 


8  THOUGHTS. 

do  here  ?  Does  not  that  strange  word  contain 
the  germ  of  many  a  recent  discovery  about  the 
transmission  of  sound  by  light,  of  light  by  sound  ? 
Every  language  has  terms  with  two  uses  to 
express  the  phenomenon  of  sound  and  the 
phenomenon  of  light.  "  Son  eclatant,"  a  pier- 
cing sound  ;  "  lumiere  eclatante,"  a  dazzling  light, 
says  the  Frenchman.  Nevertheless,  confess 
that  no  expression  is  so  true,  so  picturesque,  so 
bold  as  that  word  from  old  Homer. 


XI. 

Happy  Virgil !  How  he  has  been  petted, 
coddled,  caressed,  admired,  spoiled  by  messieurs 
the  scholiasts  !  Each  one  of  them  has  wished  to 
engrave  his  own  name  beneath  that  name,  with 
the  etching-tool,  the  knife,  it  matters  not  how. 
The  greater  part  of  the  editions  of  Virgil  appear 
speckled  with  exclamation  points,  laudatory 
parentheses,  blustering  signatures.  One  would 
say  that  it  was  a  photograph  of  Pausilippus  with 
the  sentences  which  load  down  the  walls  of  the 
marble  niche  where  sleeps  the  swan  of  Mantua. 

I  am  one  of  those  who  love  Virgil,  not  be- 
cause of  the  throng  which  roars  about  his  work, 
but  for  his  own  sake,  for  his  pure  and  melodi- 
ous soul.  How  can  one  penetrate  to  the  man 
himself   through  so  many  obstacles,  hold  con- 


LITERATURE,   POETS.  9 

verse  with  him  quite  alone,  heart  to  heart  ? 
King,  dismiss  your  court ;  friend,  disperse  these 
profane  ones  !  Poetry  is  a  mysterious  tete-a-tete. 
Speak  to  me,  speak  to  us,  and  may  nothing  and 
nobody  again  interpose  between  us  two ! 

XII. 

Tu  Marcellus  eris.  ...  "At  this  point,  Octavia 
became  ill.  On  recovering  from  her  swoon,  she 
had  ten  great  sesterces  counted  out  to  the 
poet  for  each  verse.  .  .  ." 

This  episode  effects  our  Latin  people  deeply ; 
I  suspect  the  sesterces,  those  great  sesterces, 
of  having  something  to  do  with  the  matter : 
"  Happy  poet !  Generous  Princess  !  "  and  all 
the  rest  of  it. 

Those  sesterces  spoil  those  verses  for  me; 
their  Octavia  spoils  my  Virgil  for  me. 

XIII. 

Poeta  est  omnis  scriptor.  "The  poet  is  all 
the  writer."  Who  uttered  that  profound 
saying  ?  Cicero  ?  Quintilian  ?  Saint  Jerome  ? 
Saint  Augustine  ?  Saint  Isidore  ?  No,  it  was 
a  grammarian,  long  ago  forgotten,  Despautere ! 
How  far  removed  are  we  from  those  happy 
epochs  when  even  the  schoolmen  thought 
grandly ! 


IO  THOUGHTS. 


XIV. 


Jesus  Christ  came,  the  king  of  souls,  the 
king  of  minds.  Souls  were  long  in  becoming 
Christianized ;  minds  preoccupied  with  Homer 
and  with  Virgil  were  still  more  tardy.  Am- 
brose and  Claudian  vied  with  each  other  in 
saying,  "Olympus."  Ausonius  sang  Cupid 
crucified.  The  same  incense  burned  upon  the 
same  altar  to  Jesus  and  to  Jupiter ;  the  same 
lyre  vibrated  for  the  God  of  Ida  and  the  God  of 
Tabor ;  there  was  a  daily  conflict  between  the 
two  worships  which  triumphed  in  turn,  at  the 
family  hearth,  on  the  public  square,  in  the  sen- 
ate. The  poets,  who,  like  the  seas  and  moun- 
tains, are  rich  in  images  and  echoes ;  the  poets 
faithfully  reproduced  this  contrast  in  their 
works,  and  then,  routine  is  so  powerful !  Edu- 
cation, pulled  in  two  directions  between  the 
past  and  the  future,  was  not  of  a  piece  ;  Chris- 
tian in  the  basilicas,  it  must  needs  be  pagan  in 
the  gymnasiums.  Learned  antiquity  obtruded 
itself ;  Moses,  David,  and  Job  on  one  side,  on 
the  other,  Homer,  Pindar,  and  Virgil  shared  the 
heart  of  man.  Peter,  with  the  Church,  con- 
quered the  pagan  world,  without  doubt ;  but  Cae- 
sar, with  the  Empire,  held  his  own ;  and  he  will 
never  abdicate  all  authority  over  the  mind. 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  n 

Now,  poetry  belongs  too  much  to  this  world 
to  be  entirely  independent  of  Caesar,  too  human 
to  allow  of  anything  human  being  a  stranger  to 
it.  Poets  —  I  mean  the  best — will  always  have 
in  their  heads  a  good  deal  of  paganism. 

There  are  souls  which  are  Christian  by 
nature,  wrote  Tertullian.  Granted  !  But  one  is 
not  bom  a  Christian ;  one  becomes  so,  in  poetry 
as  in  religion,  by  the  resolute  and  constant 
effort  which  is  inspired  and  aided  by  grace 
from  on  high. 

Happy  are  the  poets,  really  worthy  but  so 
rare,  alas  !  who  believe,  hope,  and  love  !  Their 
faith  will  not  be  deceived,  nor  their  hope  con- 
founded, nor  will  their  love  be  vain  and  sterile  ; 
like  those  trees  of  the  Orient  which  first  bear 
flowers  and  afterwards  their  leaves,  they  will 
blossom  before  men  in  time,  and  will  be  clothed 
with  verdure  in  eternity  before  God. 

All  the  peoples  of  Latium  contributed  to  form 
the  speech  of  Rome,  so  that  that  speech  took 
and  kept  the  name  of  the  Latin  tongue. 


xv. 

All  the  peoples  of  Latium  at  first,  and  of  the 
Universe  later  on,  contributed  to  form  the 
Empire  of  Rome;  and  that  Empire  took  and 
kept  the  name  of  the  Roman  Empire. 


12  THOUGHTS. 

The  Roman  Empire,  the  Latin  tongue !  A 
difference  of  denominations  full  of  mystery  and 
suggestion ! 

XVI. 

Two  sorts  of  writers  possess  genius :  those 
who  think,  and  those  who  cause  others  to  think. 

XVII. 

That  which  we  know  is  but  little ;  that  which 
we  have  a  presentiment  of  is  immense ;  it  is  in 
this  direction  that  the  poet  outruns  the  learned 
man. 

XVIII. 

The  Greeks  called  the  Furies  EuyLtenSe?,  the 
Eumenides,  the  kindly  ones ;  the  Hebrews 
called  death  mansuetudo,  gentleness,  and  they 
said,  gustare  mortem,  to  enjoy  death. 

All  peoples  have  these  mysterious  euphe- 
misms. 

XIX. 

The  Roman  people,  according  to  Cicero's 
avowal,  was  above  all  a  religious  people  ;  that  is 
why  facere  signified  to  sacrifice,  to  perform  the 
action  of  all  others.  With  the  Greeks,  a  poeti- 
cal and  artistic  people,  Uoielv  denoted  another 
very  excellent  action  ;  to  invent,  to  imagine,  to 
versify. 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  1 3 


XX. 

France  has  never  brought  forth  an  epic  poem 
since  the  Middle  Ages.  But  because  France 
has  deserted  the  way  of  poetry,  and  is  still 
awaiting  a  work  as  great  as  herself,  does  this 
mean  that  that  epic  monument  will  never  arise  ? 
Does  this  mean  that  it  never  has  arisen  ?  A 
people  is  one,  but  it  is  also  multiple ! 

If  our  mother  country  is  now  reputed  sterile, 
shall  we  forget  that  she  was  formerly  fruitful  ? 
She  was  fruitful  to  such  a  point  that  the  nations 
who  deny  that  she  possesses  the  epic  gift  owe 
to  her  the  poems  on  which  they  pride  them- 
selves. Whence,  if  you  please,  did  Ariosto, 
Tasso,  Milton,  Goethe,  etc.,  —  whence  did  they 
draw  their  inspiration  ?  Was  it  not  from  our 
troubadours,  was  it  not  from  our  trouveres  ? 
Charlemagne,  Roland,  Merlin,  Renaud,  Lance- 
lot, Amadys,  etc.,  are  certainly  French  names, 
French  heroes. 

Ah !  our  language  has  changed  too  often  and 
our  word  has  been  spoken  too  soon  ! 

No  matter !  they  had  the  epic  inspiration, 
they  knew  the  accent  of  the  epic  lay,  our  trou- 
veres of  the  Middle  Ages  !  If  the  syllables  em- 
ployed by  those  strong  men  had  not  suffered 
from  the  instability  of  time,  if  the  edifices  of 


14  THOUGHTS. 

their  imagination  had  resisted  revolutions,  like 
the  stone  structures  bequeathed  by  other  artists 
who  were  their  contemporaries,  the  same  admi- 
ration would  hail  all  these  works,  differing  in 
material  but  alike  in  genius  :  and  as  it  is  no  longer 
said  as  in  the  age  of  Fenelon,  that  our  Gothic 
monuments  bear  witness  against  our  architectu- 
ral genius,  even  so  it  will  cease  to  be  said  that 
we  are  poor  in  epics,  we  who  possess  a  score  of 
incomparable  chansons  de  geste. 

XXI. 

The  sentimental  is  dangerous  in  piety,  in 
morality,  in  literature,  in  everything 

XXII. 

Say  not,  "That  man  chose  a  bad  time  to 
publish  his  book."  One  must  publish  when  one 
can,  in  season  or  out  of  season.  To-day  is  in 
our  hand ;  the  past  is  there  no  longer ;  will 
there  be  any  future  ?  Why  prefer  that  which  is 
uncertain  to  the  certain  ?  The  hour  is  unpro- 
pitious  :  will  waiting  bring  a  better  one  ?  One 
must  breathe,  one  must  publish,  in  the  present. 
The  work  which  has  been  published  will,  in  the 
long  run,  free  itself  from  unfavorable  circum- 
stances, and  finish  by  being  estimated  at  its 
proper  value. 


LITERATURE,   POETS.  15 


XXIII. 

A  certain  poetic  perfection  reminds  one  of 
an  over-ripe  fruit  in  a  fair  way  to  decay.  Lucan 
polished  his  verses  more  than  Virgil  did  ;  Silius 
also,  and  Statius.  Racine  polished  less  than 
Vigny  or  Leconte  de  Lisle.  What  does  this 
signify  ?  Are  Virgil  and  Racine  on  that  account 
authors  of  the  decadence  ?  Tell  that  to  some 
one  else ! 

XXIV. 

"  A  noble  spirit  cannot  find  in  a  narrow  circle 
the  development  of  his  being.  He  must  learn 
to  endure  praise  and  blame.  .  .  .  Then  retreat 
no  longer  lulls  him  to  sleep  with  its  flattering 
illusions.  An  enemy  will  not,  a  friend  dares 
not,  spare  him." 

How  often  have  these  words  which  Goethe 
puts  into  the  mouth  of  Tasso  (Act  I.,  Scene  11.) 
troubled  me  !  Danger  from  flattering  illusions, 
in  the  retreat  which  hems  me  in ;  friends  who 
dare  not  recommend  me ;  enemies  who  over- 
throw me  with  a  blow  of  their  tongue,  and 
exterminate  me  with  the  tip  of  their  little  finger ; 
jealous  people  above,  by  my  side,  below,  whom 
I  cannot  call  by  this  name  because  they  have, 
in  the  eyes  of  men,  more  past,  present,  and 
future  than  I  have  myself;   prejudices  all  the 


l6  THOUGHTS. 

more  impossible  to  combat  because  they  are 
concealed  behind  a  semblance  of  sympathy,  — 
all  this,  at  intervals,  throws  me  into  a  sad- 
ness which  is  nearly  akin  to  death. 

xxv. 

Classic  tragedy,  by  which  I  mean  that  of  Cor- 
neille,  Racine,  and  Voltaire,  employs  very  solemn 
language  and  observes  a  very  wise  course  of 
conduct,  but  one  which  savors  too  much  of  con- 
ventionality, and  takes  too  little  interest  in  real 
history,  in  persons,  camps,  and  places. 

Hebrews,  Greeks,  Romans,  Scythians,  Par- 
thians,  Gauls,  are  moulded  in  the  same  manner, 
trained  and  costumed  in  the  same  manner.  Man, 
who  is  one  and  the  same  only  at  bottom,  always 
appears  uniform  in  spite  of  the  very  varied 
manners. 

The  drama  —  that  of  Shakespeare,  of  Goethe, 
and  of  Schiller — better  represents  the  man  like 
ourselves,  his  form,  temperament,  character,  his 
surroundings.  Less  conventionality  permits  of 
more  naturalness.  The  personage  who  poses 
and  perorates  makes  way  for  the  person  who 
acts.  The  types  are  more  perfect,  humanly 
speaking. 

In  the  drama  the  idea  is  more  interesting, 
the  field  broader,  the  design  bolder,  the  coloring 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  if 

more  lively,  the  details  more  frank  and  more 
familiar,  the  inspiration  more  original. 

Tragedy  appeals  above  all  to  the  erudite  ;  the 
drama  speaks  to  all  mankind. 

The  plans,  the  parts,  the  tirades,  the  rhythm, 
I  know  not  what  impersonal  and  routine  ele- 
ment, which  make  one  listen  without  great  sur- 
prise, characterize  tragedy. 

The  dramas  of  Shakespeare,  of  Goethe,  of 
Schiller,  even  in  translations,  even  badly  trans- 
lated, fix  the  attention,  transport,  agitate,  in  a 
singular  manner.  In  the  presence  of  the  per- 
sonages introduced  upon  the  scene,  of  their 
words,  their  tears,  their  aspirations,  their  strug- 
gles with  others  or  with  themselves,  each  person 
recognizes  himself,  and  like  the  slave  of  Terence 
he  exclaims,  Homo  sum;  nihil  humani  a  me 
alienum  puto. 

XXVI. 

Persons  of  delicate  taste  endure  stupid  criti- 
cism better  than  they  do  stupid  praise. 

XXVII. 

Calderon :  Happy  Spain,  where  an  author  can 
write  virtuous  dramas,  Christian  dramas,  Catho- 
lic dramas,  devout  dramas  !  Calderon  could  do 
all  this  tranquilly,  simply,  sublimely. 

In  the  Middle  Ages  the  clergy  of  France  were 


1 8  THOUGHTS. 

dramatists,  and  what  is  more,  impresarii.  Would 
our  critics  who  pardon  the  Spanish  priest  Cal- 
deron  for  having  been  a  dramatic  poet,  permit  a 
French  priest  to  write  dramas  or  melodramas, 
religious,  of  course,  and  to  have  them  played  ? 
If  he  came  to  grief,  what  monkey-like  laughs ! 
What  peacock  cries  if  he  succeeded  ! 

XXVIII. 

Lope  de  Vega:  He  is  not  a  garden  drawn 
with  a  chalk-line,  cut  up  into  symmetrical 
squares,  pierced  with  long,  straight  alleys,  such 
as  his  quasi-contemporary  Le  Notre  designed. 
No :  Lope  de  Vega  is  the  Spain  of  the  harsh 
sierras,  of  irregular  cities,  of  motley  costumes. 
Lope  de  Vega  is  not  a  classic  after  the  fashion 
of  France  ;  nevertheless,  he  is  Greek  and  Latin, 
vying  with  Corneille  and  Racine  ;  and  he  is  more 
of  a  man  and  more  national  than  they. 

XXIX. 

The  Duke  de  Saint-Simon  :  Scrupulous  even 
to  the  point  of  asking  himself  whether  he  has 
been  slanderous  enough. 

XXX. 

Boileau  in  one  of  his  epigrams,  said  of  him- 
self:  "Whence  comes  the  black  chagrin  which 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  19 

one  reads  upon  his  visage  ?  It  is  from  seeing 
himself  so  badly  engraved." 

How  much  more  just  chagrin  would  he  not 
display  to-day  at  seeing  himself  so  badly  known  ! 

The  eighteenth  century  abated  much  of  the 
great  esteem  accorded  to  Boileau  by  the  century 
of  Louis  XIV.  Reputations  always  suffer  these 
reverses.  Happy  are  those  which  rise  again 
undiminished  !  Happy  are  those  which  do  not 
lose  in  the  inevitable  storm  the  last  plume  from 
their  pinions ! 

The  great  man  Boileau  has,  perhaps,  not 
emerged  from  the  trial  without  damage.  Slag 
abounds  about  the  anvil. 

Where  he  makes  and  remakes  his  work  with 
more  patience  than  art,  with  more  labor  than 
inspiration,  one  hears  too  distinctly  the  noise  of 
the  bellows,  and  far  too  much  of  the  fine  sound 
of  the  flame  which  roars  and  crackles  and 
rebounds. 

His  work  fills  a  small  volume.  A  strict 
sorting  would  reduce  it  to  the  dimensions  of 
a  booklet. 

But  the  good  man  Boileau  is  ignored  more  than 
is  fitting.  The  man  surpasses  the  writer ;  his 
character  far  surpasses  his  talent. 

Possessed  of  free  and  lofty  judgment,  he  pro- 
nounces upon  merits  as  posterity  does. 

Possessed  of  a  loyal   conscience,  he  under- 


20  THOUGHTS. 

stands  "how  to  distinguish  the  poet  from  the 
man  of  honor." 

A  proud  soul,  he  does  not  excuse  himself  for 
having  found  the  king's  verses  wretched ;  he 
does  not  conceal  his  scorn  for  the  Marquis  de 
Saint-Aulaire,  an  academic  candidate. 

He  says  to  Racine,  who  was  troubled  about 
Athalie :  "  It  is  the  best  thing  you  have 
done  ! " 

He  replies  to  the  astonished  Louis  XIV., 
"The  greatest  writer  of  the  century  is  Moliere ! " 

He  recognizes  in  his  letters,  if  not  in  his 
satires,  even  the  talent  of  Quinault,  even  that 
of  Boursault. 

He  takes  it  ill  that  the  great  Corneille,  when 
aged  and  infirm,  is  neglected,  and  demands  that 
his  own  pension  shall  be  transferred  to  him  ;  it 
is  with  the  same  heart  that  he  congratulates, 
that  he  consoles,  Racine  on  receiving  a  pension 
of  four  thousand  livres,  while  he  himself  has 
but  two  thousand. 

And  his  obstinate  friendship  for  the  perse- 
cuted Arnaud  !  and  his  delicate  attentions  to 
Olivier  Patru,  whom  he  assisted  without  the  lat- 
ter's  knowledge ! 

Ye  men  of  letters,  who,  rightly  or  wrongly, 
esteem  Boileau  a  mediocre  genius,  admire  at 
least,  imitate  above  all  his  noble  spirit  and  his 
generous  character ! 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  21 


XXXI. 


Corneille,  Racine :  The  sun  does  not  enter 
without  difficulty  into  his  glory ;  he  must  first 
contend  with  the  mists  below,  against  the  clouds 
above  .  .  .  but  at  last  he  prevails,  and  darts  forth 
free  and  splendid. 

Such  was  Corneille,  such  Racine. 

A  first  flight  set  a  deep  gulf  between  them 
and  their  masters  of  yesterday,  which  soon  be- 
came an  impassable  breach. 

As  neither  their  goals  nor  the  roads  traversed 
were  the  same,  the  obstacles  were  different. 

Corneille  had  only  to  vanquish  the  mediocre ; 
that  does  not  constitute  his  glory.  His  glory 
lies  in  having  grown  great  by  himself,  without 
a  model.  Racine  had  to  reach  Corneille.  With- 
out being  his  peer,  he  was  his  equal,  a  supreme 
triumph ! 

Corneille  has  an  austere  and  rather  harsh 
visage ;  his  language  is  grave  and  rather  rugged ; 
he  is  a  father  whom  one  respects,  a  master 
whom  one  accepts  with  his  defects  and  his 
qualities.  Racine  has  a  caressing  voice,  and  a 
sweet,  sympathetic,  gracious  air :  he  is  a  brother, 
a  friend. 

Corneille  takes  possession  of  our  mind  by 
conquering  it.  Racine  plays  about .  our  heart 
and  penetrates  it  little  by  little. 


22  THOUGHTS. 

The  unforeseen,  the  roughly  sketched,  that  is 
Corneille ;  the  natural,  the  finely  finished,  that 
is  Racine. 

Corneille  is  the  lion  of  Milton  which  bounded 
towards  space,  half  life,  half  mire  still ;  Racine 
is  the  nightingale  who  from  his  very  first  rou- 
lade discovers  marvels  of  harmony. 

Corneille  says,  and  one  applauds  :  — 
Je  ne  dois  qu'a  moi  seul  toute  ma  renomme'e. 
'Tis  to  myself  alone  I  owe  all  my  renown. 

One  says  to  Racine,  with  a  smile  of  love:  — 

Je  ne  trouve  qu'en  vous,  je  ne  sais  quelle  grace, 
Qui  me  charme  toujours,  et  jamais  ne  me  lasse. 

I  find  in  you  only,  I  know  not  what  grace, 
Which  charms  ever,  tires  never,  and  naught  can 
efface. 

Corneille  is  the  painter  of  haughty  senti- 
ments, of  heroic  resolutions.  He  is  Rodrigue 
hesitating  between  love  and  honor,  then  immo- 
lating the  father  of  Chimene ;  Horace  preferring 
his  country  to  his  family,  and  Rome  to  his  child ; 
Cornelie  constrained  to  admire  the  conqueror  of 
her  husband  ;  M6dee  opposing  her  "  I !  "  to 
hostile  fortune ;  Pauline  faithful  to  memory 
and  duty  :  he  elevates  the  soul. 

Racine  paints  the  storms  of  the  heart,  its 
errors,  its  falls,  its  returns.  He  is  Andromaque 
sacrificing  her  griefs  and   her  hatreds   to  the 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  23 

safety  of  her  son ;  Hermione  cursing  the  man 
whom  she  adjured  to  kill  Pyrrhus ;  Achille 
casting  forth  insults  at  the  father  of  his  be- 
trothed ;  Phedre,  in  spite  of  herself,  u  perfidious, 
incestuous  "  :  he  moves  the  heart. 

Corneille  takes  most  of  his  types  from  a 
world  which  is,  perhaps,  chimerical,  but  which 
he  causes  to  appear  real  by  dint  of  ideality. 
What  these  personages  think  is  superhuman. 
So  much  sublimity  speedily  fatigues  man  who 
is  avaricious  in  the  matter  of  admiration. 

Racine  takes  man  as  he  is,  "  wavering  and 
various,  full  of  contradictions,"  approving  what 
is  good  and  doing  that  which  is  evil,  ceasing 
never  until  he  has  accomplished  "the  crime 
which  promised  him  pleasure  and  happiness, 
and  which  will  bring  him  only  remorse,"  touching 
in  defeat,  but  not  less  admirable  in  his  triumph. 

Behold  this  statue  :  the  forms  are  very  virile, 
almost  coarse ;  the  muscles  are  strained  and 
prominent.  One  could  count  the  network  of 
the  veins,  so  much  of  energy  and  power  is  there 
in  this  robust  body.     Such  is  Corneille. 

This  other  marble  is  of  irreproachable  purity. 
The  eye  glides  without  displeasure  along  its  soft 
contours  ;  the  limbs  are  full,  dimpled,  harmoni- 
ous ;  the  attitude  is  easy,  noble,  charming  in  its 
dignity  and  unconstraint.     Such  is  Racine. 

Corneille  is   exclusive;   his  heroes  are   per- 


24  THOUGHTS. 

sonal.  The  savage  heroism  of  the  Horaces; 
the  chivalrous  honor  of  Rodrigue  and  of  Chi- 
mene ;  the  clemency  of  Auguste  ;  the  renuncia- 
tion of  Polyeucte  belong  to  a  superior  and  also 
to  a  singular  order  of  things.  Racine,  more 
comprehensive,  likes  to  generalize.  Does  he 
draw  the  portrait  of  a  man  or  of  humanity  ? 
Phedre,  for  instance,  is  not  so  much  the  lover  of 
Hyppolite  as  passion  personified ;  passion  such 
as  can  exist  in  a  woman,  without  distinction  of 
either  time  or  country. 

There  is  something  of  Corneille  in  Britannicus 
and  Mithridate ;  of  Racine  in  Le  Ctd  and  Poly- 
eucte. Racine,  in  Be're'nice,  defeated  Corneille ; 
would  he  have  defeated  him  in  Rodogune  ? 

Corneille  and  Racine  attempted  comedy,  each 
with  the  genius  which  distinguishes  him.  Cor- 
neille is  original ;  he  invents.  Racine  imitates  ; 
he  is  original,  nevertheless. 

Corneille  shows  man  as  he  should  be,  —  good, 
generous,  faithful  to  justice  and  to  honor ;  he 
prompts  to  duty  by  preaching  virtue.  Racine 
contents  himself  with  representing  vice,  — a 
representation  which  is,  to  tell  the  truth,  rather 
attractive,  but  edifying  when  analyzed  to  the  last 
degree,  if  one  considers  the  calamities  which 
vice  sooner  or  later  produces. 

Corneille  needed  a  commentary,  since  too 
many  defects   are   mingled  with   his   beauties. 


LITERATURE,   POETS.  25 

The  commentary  of  Racine  is  wholly  comprised 
in  these  three  words  of  Voltaire,  "  Beautiful ! 
harmonious  !    sublime  ! " 

After  the  same  brilliant  beginnings  and  the 
same  brilliant  successes,  what  a  different  ending  ! 

Corneille  was  extinguished  behind  the  clouds 
which  had  veiled  his  dawn.  He,  whom  the 
theatres  welcomed  with  sudden  applause,  he 
before  whom  kings  rose  to  their  feet,  who  had 
made  the  great  Conde"  weep,  passed  from  earth 
poor,  obscure,  forgotten.  Like  that  Pomp6e 
whom  he  had  put  upon  the  stage  in  better 
days,  he  had  lived  too  much  by  a  day,  and  had 
come  to  hear  the  wish  expressed  that  he  could 
"  be  again  the  Corneille,  both  of  the  Cid  and  of 
Horace." 

Racine  was  buried  in  his  triumph.  He  did 
not  live  long  enough ;  he  bore  away  with  him 
as  many  hopes  as  regrets.  His  legacy,  at  the 
threshold  of  the  tomb,  was  his  masterpiece,  one 
of  the  masterpieces  of  the  human  mind, — 
Athalie. 

Many  prefer  Corneille ;  many  like  Racine 
better.     All  are  wrong  and  all  are  right. 

XXXII. 

Before  the  Renaissance  religion  possessed  an 
interest,  even  by  the  family  fireside,  even  in 
the  public  square.     One  was  not  a  Christian  in 


26  THOUGHTS. 

church  only.  In  order  to  understand  one's  self, 
in  order  to  make  one's  self  understood  of  others, 
the  poet  thought  and  spoke  as  a  Christian. 
The  Renaissance,  which  again  put  to  question 
what  the  Gospel  had  settled,  came ;  it  shook  the 
old  man  which  was  not  dead  but  only  sleeping ; 
it  stirred  up  that  profane,  corrupt,  untractable, 
and  mocking  depth  which  exists  in  every  man, 
and  under  the  pretence  of  liberty  and  art,  aban- 
doned itself,  soul  and  body,  to  harmonious  false- 
hoods,  to  elegant  vice,  to  erudite  perversity.  All 
sorts  of  shameful  complicities  were  established 
in  broad  daylight  or  in  the  dark,  between  the 
mind  which  was  weary  of  thinking  well,  and  the 
heart  which  was  tired  of  wishing  well ;  a  mirage 
appeared  across  the  way,  which  was  taken  for 
paradise.  Love  decreased,  faith  diminished, 
hope  fell  lower  than  the  heart.  That  new  sense 
which  Jesus  Christ  had  given  to  man  as  re- 
stored and  completed  by  baptism,  made  way  for 
the  depraved  sense  of  which  the  Apostle  speaks. 
Once  again,  all  was  God  except  God  himself; 
"  the  Prince  of  this  world,"  after  a  disgrace  of 
many  centuries,  remounted  his  throne,  and 
pagan  civilization  flourished  once  more. 

What  is  Villon  ?  an  obscene  pagan  ;  Marot  ? 
a  frivolous  pagan  ;  Ronsard  ?  a  learned  pagan  ; 
Malherbe  ?  a  purist  pagan.  Boileau  himself  is 
a  pagan ;  Racine  a  pagan  also.     Jodelle  sacri- 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  2J 

ficed  "for  luck"  a  buck  to  the  god  Bacchus, 
according  to  the  Greek  rite  ;  Boileau  gravely 
invoked,  with  his  wig  on  his  head,  that  Phoebus 
and  that  Pegasus  who  made  the  augurs,  who 
were  contemporaries  of  Cicero,  laugh,  and  Hor- 
ace and  Varro,  the  table-guests  of  Augustus, 
yawn.  The  narrow  and  monotonous  college 
moulded  minds  which  remained  faithful  all  their 
lives  to  the  form  received. 

Where  is  Jesus  ?  Will  he  be  found  after 
three  days,  in  the  Temple  ?  How  is  he  to  be 
found  if  he  is  not  sought  ?  The  eighteenth  cen- 
tury takes  nothing  seriously,  not  even  Pegasus 
and  Phoebus.  One  could  not  say  that  it  believed 
in  God,  if  it  did  not  recognize  him  after  its  own 
fashion  by  blaspheming  him.  This  third  pagan- 
ism, in  which  Voltaire  alone  is  God,  savors  of 
the  *gaming-house  and  the  brothel,  while  await- 
ing the  scaffold  promised  to  the  pagan  Andr6 
Chenier.  ... 

Later  on,  the  pagan  rut,  which  was  badly 
filled  in  at  the  moment,  is  becoming  visibly  hol- 
lowed out,  is  now  full  of  mire,  and  will  soon, 
perhaps,  be  filled  with  blood.  Oh  !  when  shall 
we  renounce  paganism,  with  all  its  works  and 
pomps,  and  become  Christians  only,  entirely 
Christians,  Christians  in  everything  and  every- 
where, Christians  in  thought,  in  word,  in  deed, 
in  writing  ? 


28  THOUGHTS. 

XXXIII. 

You  do  not  know  Oriens.  When  he  becomes 
inflamed,  you  think  he  is  strange,  but  he  is  only 
inspired ;  you  think  him  violent  when  he  is 
indignant,  —  he  is  only  generous  ;  fretful  when 
he  complains,  —  he  is  only  tender  hearted. 
Oriens  is  sensitive,  very  sensitive.  Very  little 
of  this  appears ;  it  is  within,  "  in  that  spot  where 
lies  the  heart,"  that  Oriens  is  particularly  alive 
to  feeling.  There  is  his  sorrowful  part.  Oriens 
loves  to  distraction  the  good  and  the  beautiful. 
All  that  is  false,  bad,  hideous,  makes  him  leap 
and  cry  aloud.  All  that  might  be  very  good, 
but  is  only  a  little  good ;  very  true,  but  is  not 
sufficiently  so ;  very  beautiful,  but  is  so  only  in 
half  measure,  pains  him.  Ah  !  leave  him  his 
repugnances,  and  his  heart-heaviness,  peculiar 
to  a  nature,  proud,  delicate,  and  noble !  Do  not 
fear  that  it  will  prove  widely  contagious ! 
Neither  examples  nor  exhortations  will  be  lack- 
ing to  dissuade  or  correct  those  who  would 
imitate  Oriens ! 

xxxiv. 

What  remains  of  Segrais,  Racan,  Bertaut, 
Desportes,  etc.  ?  Hardly  a  stanza,  at  most  a 
tirade.  And  yet  their  talent  was  remarkable ; 
and  their  names  will  survive  in  collections  of 
poetry  and  in  anthologies. 


LITERATURE,   POETS.  29 

Oh !  poets  of  the  present  day,  romanticists, 
Parnassians,  etc.,  are  you  sure  of  leaving  even 
a  name  ? 

xxxv. 

It  is  a  remarkable  fact,  that  not  one  of  the 
numerous  epic  enterprises  in  France  since  the 
Middle  Ages,  has  either  succeeded  or  deserved 
to  succeed,  Neither  Du  Bartas,  nor  Lemoine, 
nor  Chapelain,  nor  twenty  others  have  broken 
the  charm.  Voltaire  by  his  Henriade  has  con- 
secrated our  reputation  for  impotence,  and  the 
proverb  has  prevailed,  that  "the  Frenchman 
has  not  an  epic  head."  Portugal  has  Camoens ; 
Spain,  Ercilla ;  Italy,  Tasso  ;  England,  Milton  ; 
Germany,  Klopstock  ;  France,  nothing  !  It  will 
be  said,  "The  epoch  of  the  great  epics  is  over." 
So  it  was  said  in  England  before  Paradise  Lost; 
in  Germany,  before  The  Messiah. 

What  is  the  cause  of  our  poverty  ?  To  what 
must  our  disgrace  be  attributed  ?  Du  Bartas  is 
not  read  because  of  his  superannuated  style? 
But  La  Chanson  de  Roland  is  still  older,  and  it 
is  admired.  Lemoine  is  not  read  because  of  his 
bad  taste  ?  But  Milton  abounds  in  grotesque 
inventions  and  ridiculous  expressions,  and  he  is 
admired.  Chapelain,  because  of  his  harshness 
and  his  coldness  ?  But  Klopstock  also  was  cold 
and  rugged,  and  he  is  admired.     Du  Bartas  had 


30  THOUGHTS. 

genius,  Lemoine  had  genius,  Chapelain  had 
genius ;  more  than  that,  they  were  believers. 
Du  Bartas  adored  the  Word  of  God  in  the  Bible, 
vying  in  that  respect  with  Klopstock  and  Mil- 
ton ;  Chapelain  adored  it  in  the  Gospel,  equally 
with  Camoens,  Tasso,  and  Ercilla ;  Lemoine 
was  as  pious  as  a  Jesuit ;  and  yet  they  are  only 
recalled  with  a  shrug  of  the  shoulders,  or  a  yawn 
indulged  in  with  closed  mouth  ! 

Who  knows?  Du  Bartas,  Lemoine,  Chape- 
lain, properly  translated  into  Italian  or  English, 
would,  perhaps,  appear  new  in  their  splendor 
and  grace. 

The  epic  poem,  frightfully  trampled  under  foot 
by  the  author  of  the  Art  of  Poetry,  had  passed 
for  dead  for  a  long  time,  when,  towards  the  close 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  Gilbert  suddenly  pro- 
claimed the  great  news,  "  Thomas  is  in  labor 
with  a  great  epic  poem  !  " 

After  La  Pe'tre'ide,  an  abortion,  came  Philippe 
Angus  te,  still-born. 

Then  the  wind  veered  to  the  didactic  poem ; 
and  The  Three  Kingdoms,  The  Seasons,  The 
Months,  Navigation,  Painting,  Plants,  etc., 
winged  their  heavy  flight  towards  the  unknown, 
far  away,  so  far  that  no  one  has  heard  them 
mentioned  since. 

It  was  said  that  the  epic  was  not  only  dead, 
but  well  and  thoroughly  buried.     It  was  both 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  3 1 

said  and  thought,  —  while  immortal,  it  emerged 
from  the  tomb,  transfigured  like  the  butterfly. 

In  spite  of  Boileau's  oracle,  in  spite  of  so 
many  epic  catastrophes  which  confirmed  him, 
in  spite  of  the  opinion  which  held  that  the  case 
had  been  adjudged  finally  and  without  appeal, 
the  epic,  the  Christian  epic  claimed  its  place 
again  in  the  light  of  the  sun. 

It  sang  of  God,  of  heaven  and  hell,  of  the 
angels  and  the  saints  ;  of  man  —  his  sin,  his  ex- 
ile, his  redemption,  his  approaching  reconcilia- 
tion ;  of  the  priest  —  his  humble  kingdom,  his 
obscure  heroism.  It  was  Christian,  as  I  have 
said ;  it  was  not  Catholic.  Heresy  is  also  Chris- 
tian !  Schism  is  also  Christian  !  The  truth  was 
received,  subject  to  correction.  Under  the  pre- 
text of  art,  in  reality  out  of  human  respect,  this 
was  lopped  off,  that  was  altered.  People  thought 
to  embellish  what  they  merely  glossed  over.  To 
the  immaculate  and  only  robe  of  the  Church, 
borrowed  stuffs,  of  which  she  would  none,  were 
stitched.  "  Glorification  !  "  affirmed  the  poet ; 
"  Profanation  !  "  replied  the  priest. 

Witness,  La  Divine  Epopie  of  Alexandre 
Soumet,  and  Jocelyn,  by  Alphonse  de  Lamartine. 

The  one  said  that ;  the  other  said  it  to  him- 
self. Fatal  error  !  They  understood  it  too 
late. 

In   truth,   the    soul    often  dreams    imperti- 


32  THOUGHTS. 

nences.  Is  it  in  the  wrong?  If  it  be,  then 
the  lyre  cannot  be  in  the  right. 
*  If  Lamartine  and  Soumet  had  listened  to 
their  faith  and  not  to  a  vain  and  culpable  whim, 
how  much  their  talent  would  have  been  increased 
in  its  sweep  !  and  how  much  higher  would  their 
names  have  risen,  borne  by  those  two  angelic 
wings,  "truth  and  poetry  "  ! 

XXXVI. 

Certain  persons  are  persuaded  that,  in  order 
to  be  a  writer  of  merit,  there  is  required  neither 
reason,  nor  judgment,  nor  knowledge  of  men, 
nor  experience  of  things,  nor  assiduous  study, 
nor  persevering  exercise,  but  only  an  uncon- 
scious, involuntary,  instinctive  something,  which 
they  call  talent. 

XXXVII. 

Antique  art  clothed  the  human  body  in  mod- 
esty and  majesty  ;  modern  art  unclothes  even 
the  nude.  It  is  immodest,  and  sometimes  even 
impudent.  Athens  diffused  the  soul  over  the 
flesh ;  Paris  diffuses  the  flesh  over  the  soul. 
The  Greek  statue  blushed  ;  the  French  statue 
causes  blushes. 

XXXVIII. 

Malherbe  raved  over  Seneca ;  Corneille  over 
Lucan.     These  two  Spaniards   matched   these 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  33 

two  Normans.     The  "  high-flown  "  is  the  style 
of  these  four  geniuses. 

XXXIX. 

Shakespeare :  Greater  than  history,  as  great 
as  poetry,  he  alone  would  suffice  for  the  litera- 
ture of  a  nation. 

Addison  :  Shakespeare  is  an  ocean  ;  Addison 
an  aquarium. 

Milton :  He  sings  ecstasy  like  Gabriel,  hate 
like  Lucifer,  love  like  Eve,  repentance  like 
Adam. 

Goldsmith :  His  Vicar  of  Wakefield,  trans- 
lated by  Charles  Nodier,  attaches  itself  to  the 
memory  as  with  nails  of  gold. 

Walter  Scott :  History  lives  again  in  his  ro- 
mances, which  are  so  upright,  so  delicate,  so 
true,  when  he  resists  the  temptation  to  blacken 
the  monks. 

Thomas  Moore :  What  a  patriotic  perfume  in 
his  verses,  which  fly  as  light  and  fresh  as  the 
breezes ! 

Byron :  A  pure  blood,  slender,  proud,  bold, 
impatient  of  the  rein,  an  enemy  of  the  spur,  in- 
tractable under  the  whip,  and  who  is  counted 
vicious,  and  is  only  fantastic. 

XL. 

Each  person  alights  by  instinct  upon  the 
books  which  respond  to  the  needs  of  his  nature. 


34  THOUGHTS. 

XLI. 

Voltaire  allowed  this  phrase  to  escape  him : 
"  Chaulieu  is  the  first  of  neglected  poets  ..." 
The  first  of  neglected  poets,  O  Voltaire !  is 
the  author  of  La  Henriade,  and  of  so  many 
other  poems  ;  the  author  of  Zaire,  and  so  many 
other  tragedies.  Few  poets  versify  as  badly  as 
he. 

XLII. 

Since  Voltaire's  day  we  grin ;  we  no  longer 
laugh. 

XLIII. 

Never  did  writers  have  less  sensibility  and 
say  more  about  it  than  those  of  the  eighteenth 
century. 

XLIV. 

Lemiere :  A  hard  pebble  which  emits  sparks. 

Bernis  :  Always  nature,  never  the  natural. 

Dorat :   Between  caterpillar  and  butterfly. 

ficouchard  Lebrun :  A  virile  head,  the  soul 
of  a  eunuch. 

Malfilatre  :  An  abortive  genius. 

Gentil-Bernard :  An  impotent  man  who  is 
always  talking  of  marriage. 

Piron  :  An  original  improviser ;  a  common- 
place writer. 

XLV. 

The  name  is  the  man ;  renown  is  the  writer. 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  35 

XLVI. 

Goethe :  A  German  drinking-cup  engraved  at 
Corinth. 

Schiller  has  put  into  a  drama  the  history 
which  he  read  in  a  dream. 

Klopstock :  A  mortuary  pall  sown  with  tears 
of  silver. 

Burger  has  written  ballads  which  are  epic 
poems. 

Wieland  has  composed  an  epic  poem  which 
is  only  a  ballad. 

Hoffmann  has  caught  a  glimpse  of  a  whole 
world  of  fancy  through  the  smoke  of  his  pipe, 
as  one  views  an  eclipse  through  a  bit  of  smoked 
glass. 

XL  VII. 

In  matters  of  art,  quality  should  be  preferred 
to  quantity ;  and  if  etymology  is  right,  nothing 
is  elegant  which  has  not  been  culled  out. 

XLVIII. 

Jean  Baptiste  Rousseau :  An  echo  of  David, 
a  reflection  of  Pindar,  a  shade  of  Horace. 

Beaumarchias  :  A  happy  autumn  day,  against 
which  the  fall  of  a  dead  leaf  strikes  here  and 
there  with  a  sinister  sound. 

Buffon  :  A  head  of  gold,  a  breast  of  silver,  legs 
of  brass,  feet  of  clay,  like  the  statue  of  Daniel. 


36  THOUGHTS. 

Voltaire :  The  spirit  of  a  courtier  and  the 
heart  of  a  courtisan. 

Laharpe :  Much  facility,  a  little  talent,  no 
genius. 

Marmontel :  An  aviary  wherein  are  many 
sorts  of  birds,  with  the  exception  of  the  eagle 
and  the  dove. 

XLIX. 

The  poet  sees  everything  in  the  present,  like 
God. 

L. 

Andre  Cheerier :  A  beautiful  Athenian  temple 
without  an  altar  to  the  unknown  God. 

Parny  :  A  dung-heap  which  smells  and  glitters. 

Baour-Lormian :  A  great  butterfly,  caught  in 
the  strings  of  a  harp. 

Collin  d'Harleville :  He  listens  to  his  own 
talk,  and  gazes  at  his  own  laugh. 

Berchoux :  His  rhymes  fall  slow,  heavy, 
stifling,  like  the  rain  of  roses  at  the  feast  of 
Heliogabalus. 

LI. 

Expressions  which  one  chances  upon  have 
something  antique  about  them,  I  know  not  what. 

LII. 

Vigny :  Fingers  of  rose,  tears  of  pearl,  like 
the  Aurora  of  Homer. 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  37 

H6g.  Moreau :  A  spoiled  apple  which  is  still 
unripe,  and  which  must  be  carefully  cleansed 
before  one  tastes  it. 

Sainte-Beuve  :  What  poetry  in  his  prose,  and 
what  prose  in  his  poetry! 

Auguste  Barbier:  Plenty  of  thunder-claps, 
little  or  no  lightning. 

LIII. 

Auguste  Brizeux,  in  Les  Bretons,  runs  the  risk 
of  bursting  the  veins  in  his  neck  in  his  desire  to 
swell  the  horn  of  Armor.  One  thinks  one  is  list- 
ening to  some  ancient  bard  translated  by  Baour- 
Lormian.  He  has  transgressed  the  precept  of 
Horace,  "to  avoid  a  burden  beyond  his  strength." 

LIV. 

Since  modern  poetry,  rightly  or  wrongly, 
handles  the  graver's  tool  by  preference,  Sou- 
lary  is  certainly  a  master-graver.  One  expe- 
riences in  the  eye  and  hand,  while  reading  him, 
the  sensation  of  an  amphora  or  a  cratera,  which 
one  seems  to  see  and  to  touch.  But  why  does 
rationalism  twine  about  these  murrhine  vases 
like  a  crack  of  misfortune  ? 

LV. 

Nowadays  the  literature  of  children  abounds. 
Hugo,  S6galas,  Ortolan,  Beauchene,  Jean 
Aicard,  Ratisbonne,  have  vied  in  singing    the 


38  THOUGHTS. 

children.  Eugenie  de  Guerin  also  wished  to 
sing  them.  This  vein  is  novel,  this  vein  is  rich  ; 
I  do  not  deny  it,  and  I  complain  of  nothing 
except  that  this  literature  of  the  children  is  not 
unfrequently  childish. 

LVI. 

There  is  no  complaint  that  there  are  too  many 
painters,  too  many  musicians,  but  the  opinion 
exists  that  there  are  too  many  poets.     Why  ? 

Painting,  music,  are,  as  trades,  still  endurable  ; 
poetry,  unless  it  is  a  real  vocation,  scandal- 
izes. Being  more  divine,  one  wishes  it  to  be 
more  discrete ;  being  less  rare,  it  appears  less 
precious  ;  noble  above  all,  it  loses  more  when  it 
becomes  unworthy. 

LVII. 

The  poet,  the  artist,  the  saint,  say  incessantly, 
"Again!  higher!"  The  beyond  attracts  them 
ever.  What  they  hold  is  little  to  them.  The 
anguish  which  they  suffer  marks,  if  it  does  not 
measure,  the  happiness  which  they  long  for. 
And  they  struggle,  and  lament,  and  strive,  and 
tax  their  ingenuity  for  the  love  of  that  shore, 
"further  on,"  of  which  Virgil  speaks:  ripce 
ulterioris  amore. 

LVIII. 

Jacques  Delille  is  a  poet-professor  who  is 
very  clever  in  treating  a  given  subject.     His 


LITERATURE,   POETS.  39 

"poetry "is  neither  a  field  nor  a  meadow,  nor 
even  a  garden,  but  a  cellar,  an  herbarium,  garn- 
ished with  dried  fruits  and  dead  flowers.  His 
tears  are  deliberate,  his  smile  studied.  He 
excites  himself  coolly.  His  tirades  are  very 
ingenious  pieces  which  show  the  springs  that 
move  them.  He  proceeds  by  articles,  like  the 
vulgar  cook.  He  mterprets  nature  as  he  did 
Virgil,  with  his  head,  not  with  his  heart.  He  is 
a  mummy  which  possesses  the  attitude  but  not 
the  movement  of  life ;  he  is  the  animal  caught 
in  the  ice  at  the  moment  of  his  supreme  effort, 
which  is  always  on  the  point  of  beginning  and 
never  will  begin.  Praxiteles  gave  animation 
to  stone  ;  Delille  petrifies  thought,  sentiment, 
the  image.  He  is  the  fountain  of  Saint- Alyre 
of  poetry.  .  .  . 

LIX. 

Paul-Louis  Courrier :  Never,  thanks  to  him, 
have  words  seemed  more  synomyous  than  style 
and  stiletto. 

George  Sand :  Like  Circe  the  enchantress, 
she  transforms  those  whom  she  enamors  into 
beasts. 

LX. 

The  task  of  demolishing  Chateaubriand  has 
been  attempted.  Saint-Beuve  multiplied  him- 
self in  order  to  attain  his  level.  .  .  .  Vain  effort ! 


40  THOUGHTS. 

Try  as  one  will  to  uncrown,  to  dismantle  him, 
he  can  never  be  lessened  to  such  a  degree  that 
he  will  not  still  overtop  by  head  and  shoulders 
the  most  supercilious  of  his  enemies. 

LXI. 

Victor  Hugo :  This  manly  genius  always 
strikes  strongly  if  he  does  not  often  strike 
justly.  Not  content  with  wandering  from  the 
question,  he  talks  wildly.  It  is  himself  that 
he  pursues,  that  he  admires,  that  he  loves,  that 
he  adores,  himself  always,  himself  everywhere, 
himself  alone ! 

What  a  magnificent  career ! 

What  a  magnificent  career  he  has  run  badly  ! 

LXII. 

Madame  de  Girardin  :  She  sings  badly,  but 
oh  !  the  wondrous  prattle. 

She  combats  Paris,  its  vices,  its  absurdities, 
as  Clorinda  warred  against  Tancred,  consider- 
ately. 

LXIII. 

Every  woman  who  writes  immodestly,  lives 
in  the  same  way. 

lxiv.  - 

It  is  in  vain  that  Eugene  de  G^urin  praises 
Maurice ;  the  more  she  recommends  him,  the 
more  she  effaces  him. 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  41 

The  love  which  she  bore  her  brother  greatly 
scandalized  many  literary  persons.  Their  cor- 
ruption thought  it  perceived  therein  a  nameless 
perversity.     The  wretches ! 

Eugenie  never  rests  from  loving.  She  ardently 
desires  literary  glory  for  Maurice,  and  above  all, 
that  celestial  glory  which  is  far  preferable.  This 
anguish  of  a  Christian  sister  is  something  new 
in  French  literature.  One  admires  and  loves 
this  sweet,  pious  Eugenie,  devoted  in  life  and 
death.  As  for  Maurice,  he  is  only  insipid  and 
colorless.  He  has  some  imagination,  no  char- 
acter. He  does  nothing  but  flutter  about  in  a 
fickle,  or,  what  is  worse,  an  undecided,  way. 

Maurice  disenchants,  even  in  his  finest  pas- 
sages, by  a  certain  school-boy  accent.  Le  Ce?z- 
taure  is  only  a  brilliant  imitation  of  Bitaub6,  of 
Chateaubriand  and  of  Quinet.  Eugenie  con- 
ceals, perhaps  ignores,  her  art,  which  is  exquisite. 
She  appears  solicitous  of  writing  well,  without, 
for  that  reason,  believing  herself  to  be  a  writer. 
She  is  not  so  much  conscious  of  herself  as  she 
divines  herself.  Beneath  the  evident  desire  of 
pleasing  her  brother,  a  hack  writer,  peeps  the 
desire  of  sooner  or  later  interesting  the  public. 
She  is  careful  of  her  phrasing,  somewhat  as  the 
narve  young  girl  cares  for  her  face,  with  a  co- 
quettish innocence. 


42  THOUGHTS. 


LXV. 

Literature  was  formerly  an  art  and  finance  a 
trade  :  to-day  it  is  the  reverse. 

LXVI. 

We  write  numerous  works  in  order  to  multi- 
ply our  chances  with  posterity,  as  one  takes 
several  tickets  in  a  lottery  in  order  to  be  more 
sure  of  winning.  But  very  often  a  single  ticket 
brings  happiness,  a  single  book  brings  fame. 

LXVII. 

Vigny  is  above  all  things  Greek,  Musset  above 
all  Gallic  ;  Vigny  has  more  variety,  Musset  more 
spirit ;  Vigny  more  art,  Musset  more  natural- 
ness ;  Vigny  is  delicate,  Musset  is  fine ;  Vigny 
is  ingenious,  Musset  is  spiritual. 

Vigny  was  at  first  biblical,  almost  religious ; 
then  he  gradually  became  sceptical.  Musset, 
who  was  for  a  long  time  obscene  and  impious, 
knew  remorse  towards  the  end,  and  perhaps 
repentance.  I  speak  of  the  poet,  for  the  man, 
less  hard  to  please  than  the  Duke  of  Clarence, 
had  early  disappeared  in  a  cask  of  gin. 

LXVIII. 

Jules  Janin  :  He  writes ;  afterwards  he  thinks. 
Charles  Nodier :  A  little  of  everything,  not 
much  of  anything. 


LITERATURE,  POETS.  43 

Joseph  Autran  :  A  small  shell,  within  which 
roars  the  great  sea. 

Beranger :  The  collection  of  his  songs  at  first 
passed  for  a  monument  of  patriotism.  The  time 
will  come,  if  it  has  not  already  come,  when  this 
same  collection  will  be  a  curious  repertory, 
neither  more  nor  less,  of  impieties,  impurities, 
and  vanities,  which  passed  current  in  a  great 
disordered  nation,  at  a  sad  epoch  in  its  history. 

Casimir  Delavigne :  Too  different  from  Tyr- 
taeus  and  too  much  like  Racine. 

LXIX. 

The  majority  of  the  writers  of  genius  recall 
the  Mormoluktion  of  the  Greek  theatre,  tragic 
on  one  side,  comic  on  the  other  ;  they  willingly 
throw  in  a  burst  of  laughter  between  two  serious 
works  or  two  pathetic  tirades. 

LXX. 

Labor  does  not  exclude  naturalness,  neither 
does  facility  imply  it. 

LXXI. 

Science  is  for  those  who  learn ;  poetry,  for 
those  who  know. 

LXXII. 

Etymology,  true  etymology,  is  good  and  use- 
ful.    It  is   profitable  for  the   grammarian,  the 


44  THOUGHTS. 

poet,  the  orator,  the  historian,  the  philosopher. 
Words  are  shells.  Open  the  shell,  you  will  find 
the  kernel  which  will  delight  you. 

LXXIII. 

The  Muses  love  not  tumult  any  more  than 
bees  love  it.     Musce  serence,  said  the  ancients. 

Let  us  be  gentle,  let  us  be  pacific,  let  us  be 
thoughtful,  and  the  Muses  will  hasten  to  us,  will 
surround  us  with  the  sound  of  their  wings,  and, 
perhaps,  will  place  upon  our  lips  one  of  those 
combs  of  honey  which  rendered  Ambrose  elo- 
quent, Virgil  melodious,  and  Plato  divine. 

LXXIV. 

A  fine  quotation  is  a  diamond  on  the  finger 
of  a  man  of  wit,  and  a  pebble  in  the  hand  of  a 
fool. 

LXXV. 

The  punishment  of  licentious  writers  is  that 
no  one  will  read  them  or  confess  to  having  read 
them. 

LXXVI. 

Poetry  is  truth  in  its  Sunday  clothes. 


II. 

ELOQUENCE,   ORATORS. 


A  passable  definition  of  eloquence  would 
be,  Anima  erumpens.  But  how  can  that  be 
translated  into  French  ? 

ii. 

.  .  .  Habens  os  rectiun  et  bene*  semens.  This 
definition  of  the  orator  in  the  Scriptures  is  almost 
unknown,  although  it  is  quite  as  good  as  the 
famous  Vir  bonus  dicendi  peritus. 

in. 

To  interest  the  passions,  to  impassion  the 
interests,  behold !   this  is  the  aim  of  eloquence. 

IV. 

Without  eloquence  one  is  not  a  poet ;  with- 
out poetry  one  is  not  an  orator. 

v. 

The  word  tolerates  and  knows  only  the  will 
which  masters  it,  and  carries  far  without  peril 


46  THOUGHTS. 

only  the  intelligence  which  spares  the  spur  and 
bridle  while  maintaining  its  supremacy. 

VI. 

A  good  oratorical  exercise  is  to  make  verses. 
Thus  harmony  is  acquired,  the  soul,  the  num- 
ber, the  body  of  discourse. 

VII. 

Let  us  not  judge  the  eruption  by  the  con- 
gealed lava,  nor  the  improvisation  by  the  written 
page. 

VIII. 

Who  is  there  who  has  never  been  moved  even 
to  swooning  before  speaking  in  public  ?  It  is  a 
profound  anguish  which  invades  the  flesh,  the 
blood,  the  mind,  and  the  heart.  What  can  be 
done  to  conquer  this  revolution  of  the  senses, 
to  calm  this  tumult  of  the  soul  ?  Shall  one 
grow  angry,  curse  one's  self,  taunt  one's  self  ? 

My  friend,  the  orator,  in  this  crisis,  pray,  if 
you  are  a  priest ;  if  you  are  not  a  priest,  still 
pray. 

IX. 

The  grenadiers  who  took  Port-Mahon,  when 
they  measured  with  their  eyes  on  the  following 
day  all  those  thick,  lofty  walls,  bristling  with 
instruments  of  attack  and  defence,  could  not 
recover  their  senses  at  having  scaled  such  ram- 


ELOQUENCE,    ORATORS.  47 

parts  and  taken  possession  of  such  fortifications. 
Intoxicated  with  heroism,  they  had  done  more 
than  they  would  have  dared  to  undertake  in 
cold  blood.  Thus  the  orator,  impelled  onward 
by  inspiration,  borne  upwards  by  the  fever  of 
speech,  makes  conquests  which  astonish  him 
afterwards. 

x. 

There  are  men  to  whom  the  rostrum  or  the 
pulpit  is  a  sort  of  pillory,  where  they  appear 
riveted,  pale,  hesitating,  confused;  such  men 
suffer  and  cause  suffering.  There  are  others 
who  in  the  rostrum  or  the  pulpit  are  as  if 
mounted  on  the  tripod,  —  ardent,  transfigured, 
fascinating.  How  happy  they  are  to  speak! 
how  happy  one  is  to  listen  to  them  ! " 

XI. 

The  orator,  with  a  glance,  measures  immense 
space.  .  .  .  Meanwhile,  the  word  neighs  and 
paws  in  its  impatience.  "  Go  !  "  is  said  to  it  at 
last,  and  the  word,  launched  at  a  gallop,  shakes 
the  earth,  strikes  out  sparks,  devours  distances, 
and  triumphs ! 

XII. 

A  lecturer  of  Notre  Dame  said,  "If  one 
wishes  to  preach  well,  one  must  have  the  devil 
in  one's  body."  Why  did  he  not  add,  "And 
God  in  the  heart "  ? 


48  THOUGHTS. 


XIII. 

He  whines  and  weeps,  thinking  to  make  me 
tender.  If  he  were  tender  himself,  the  thing 
would  be  done. 

XIV. 

Do  you  know  who  is  Loquax's  best  auditor  ? 
It  is  Loquax  himself.  Loquax  watches  himself 
and  listens  to  himself  speak,  with  a  very  visible 
content.  He  bends  towards  what  he  says,  and 
puts  his  ear  to  his  lips  in  order  not  to  lose  a 
word.  He  quotes  himself;  he  adjudges  himself 
to  be  in  the  right ;  he  admires  himself ;  he  ap- 
plauds himself.  While  speaking  he  has  the 
gestures,  the  motions,  the  attitudes  of  a  juggler. 
Nothing  escapes  him  that  is  simple  and  naff. 
All  is  deliberately  planned,  measured,  combined, 
prepared.  His  conversation  is  a  treatise  of 
rhetoric,  in  which  all  the  figures  of  speech  file 
by,  principally  the  antithesis,  dear  to  Hugo, 
the  epiphonema  familiar  to  Chateaubriand.  All 
would  be  according  to  his  heart's  desire,  no 
doubt,  if  the  witness  of  this  strange  monologue, 
I  dare  not  call  him  the  interlocutor,  wearying  of 
the  mute  r61e  of  a  personage,  did  not  withdraw, 
slip  away,  before  the  tardy  peroration,  with  a 
shake  of  the  head  and  a  shrug  of  the  shoulders. 


ELOQUENCE,    ORATORS.  49 

XV. 

"The  cold  truth."  O  preacher  of  the 
Word,  what  are  you  saying  ?  The  truth  cold  ? 
But  the  truth  is  life,  fruitfulness,  joy,  all  things 
that  are  warm.  The  truth,  which  is  the  word  of 
God  himself,  is  warm,  burning,  fiery !  Ignitum 
eloquium  tuum  vehementer. 

XVI. 

Demosthenes  prepared  himself  by  severe 
study  to  become  in  fact  the  force  of  the  Athen- 
ian people  (Arj/jLov  £#eVo?).  His  apprenticeship 
as  an  orator  is  legendary,  —  a  subterranean  re- 
treat, hair  and  beard  shaved,  Thucydides  tran- 
scribed many  times,  pebbles  placed  in  his  mouth, 
declamations  on  the  seashore.  .  .  .  Tales  fabri- 
cated, perhaps,  but  whose  harmony  and  concord 
bear  witness  to  a  precocious  energy  which  was 
not  belied  by  the  future. 

In  vain  are  accusations  upon  accusations 
launched  against  this  lofty  renown ;  they  fall 
back  powerless  at  his  feet.  Demosthenes  is  no 
longer  the  name  of  a  man  ;  Demosthenes  is  the 
name  of  eloquence  itself. 

Was  he  large  or  small,  homely  or  handsome  ? 
Was  he  pusillanimous,  versatile  ?  The  inquiry 
which  was  opened  centuries  ago,  has  not  solved 
these  problems.    It  matters  little.    The  imagina- 


50  THOUGHTS. 

tion  persists  in  representing  to  itself  Demos* 
thenes  as  great  of  body  and  great  of  heart ; 
one  does  not  admit  that  this  quality  of  elo- 
quence could  have  gushed  forth  from  a  narrow- 
chest,  could  have  fallen  from  a  sordid  soul. 
The  man  is  to-day  unanimously  saluted  as  the 
equal  of  the  orator. 

The  discourse  Uepl  arecpavov,  read  by  the 
jealous  -^Eschines,  before  the  whole  school  of 
Rhodes,  provoked  enthusiasm  :  — 

"  What  would  it  be  then,"  exclaimed 
^Eschines,  "  if  you  had  heard  the  monster !  " 
Posterity  consoles  itself  for  not  hearing  the 
monster,  by  vying  with  the  Rhodians  in 
applauding  him. 

His  relations  with  Harpalus,  the  Persian,  ap- 
peared suspicious.  For  lack  of  proof,  they  were 
forced  to  acquit  him,  if  not  to  absolve  him. 
He  is  also  reproached  with  the  disaster  of 
Cheronea.  The  duty  of  the  great  orator  did 
not  extend  so  far  as  conquering ;  he  confined 
himself  to  convincing  the  Athenians  of  the 
necessity  of  fighting,  and  to  fighting  himself. 
At  the  Pnyx,  Demosthenes  personified  the 
whole  of  Greece ;  at  Cheronea-  he  was  only  a 
soldier. 

Moreover,  Calaurea  found  him  shortly  after- 
wards, worthy  of  himself,  worthy  of  Athens. 
He  preferred  death  to  living  as  the  slave  of  Anti- 


ELOQUENCE,    ORATORS.  51 

pater.  .  .  .  This  suicide  is  rightly  revolting  to 
our  Christian  customs. 

Let  us  pity  him,  but  let  us  not  despise  him. 

As  for  myself,  I  admire  Demosthenes,  who 
was  obedient  to  his  unenlightened  conscience, 
faithful  to  that  which  seemed  to  him  to  be  vir- 
tue ;  just,  even  to  the  point  of  condemning  him- 
self to  death,  scrupulous  to  the  degree  of  choos- 
ing the  poison  so  that  he  might  punish,  alas ! 
those  too  generous  lips  and  too  eloquent  heart 
for  having  involuntarily  caused  the  misfortune 
of  Athens,  his  well-beloved  country. 

XVII. 

If  within  thy  breast  beats  a  heart  warm,  loyal, 
generous,  a  heroic  heart,  speak ;  oh,  speak !  If 
not,  silence,  sounding  brass !  silence,  thou  tink- 
ling cymbal ! 

XVIII. 

Onesimus  speaks  with  elegance,  a  cold  ele- 
gance.    It  is  icy,  and  so  is  his  audience  also. 

XIX. 

Ah !  how  many  phrases !  Ah !  how  many 
ideas ! 

A  single  phrase  well  thought  out  is  worth  a 
whole  thousand  of  these  superfluous  ideas  ;  a 
single  idea,  well  developed,  is  worth  a  whole 
thousand  of  these  redundant  phrases. 


52  THOUGHTS. 


XX. 

From  the  mouth  of  a  Gallic  god  issued  a 
chain  of  gold,  the  symbol  of  eloquence.  Oh ! 
who  will  find  the  lost  links  of  that  precious 
chain  ? 

XXI. 

Cicero  is  not  exclusively  an  orator  like  Demos- 
thenes ;  he  is,  besides,  a  philosopher,  a  man  of 
letters,  etc.  I  say  "besides,"  and  not  "in  addi- 
tion," since  this  diversity  of  aptitudes  added 
little  to  his  greatness. 

Ingenious,  elegant,  delicate,  Cicero  is  gener- 
ally lacking  in  energy,  I  mean  that  sovereign 
energy  which  characterizes  Demosthenes.  In 
Demosthenes,  the  orator  predominates ;  in 
Cicero,  the  lawyer.  The  one  possesses  more 
genius,  the  other  more  talent.  It  seems  as 
though  the  country  spoke  with  the  voice  of  the 
Grecian  orator.  In  this  he  is  indeed  the  "ora- 
tor." Orator  signifies  deputy,  ambassador,  dele- 
gate of  the  people.  The  orator  is  the  mouth 
(os)  of  a  nation.  Cicero  forgets  himself  less, 
keeps  himself  less  in  the  background.  The  Re- 
public is  of  great  importance  to  him,  one  cannot 
doubt  that ;  but  he  does  not  sufficiently  prefer 
Rome,  apparently,  to  all  other  things,  even  to 
his  own  glory,  nor  to  all  other  persons,  even 
himself : 


ELOQUENCE,   ORATORS.  53 

O  fortunatam  Romam  me  consule  natam  ! 

So  much  vanity  belittles  the  man,  belittles 
the  orator. 

In  Cicero's  day,  the  toga  and  the  sword  dis- 
puted Rome,  that  is  to  say,  the  Universe,  be- 
tween them.  Victory  wavered,  at  first,  between 
the  camps  and  the  rostrums ;  the  rostrums  were 
Cicero,  the  camps,  Octavius.  But  when  the  age 
is  not  one  of  virtue  or  even  of  law,  force  finally 
wins  the  day  against  reason,  and  the  sword  cuts 
short  speech. 

Cicero,  weary  of  anguish  and  uncertainty, 
despairing  of  ever  restoring  order  to  the  State, 
wished  at  least  to  introduce  it  into  his  own  con- 
duct ;  he  paid  with  his  life  for  this  noble  reso- 
lution. 

A  few  days  later,  he  was  seen  to  lean  quietly 
on  the  edge  of  his  litter,  and  to  offer  his  head  to 
the  emissaries  of  Antonius,  without  saying  a 
word,  he  who  had  said  so  much  and  said  it  so  well. 

All  the  sublime  attitudes,  all  the  pathetic 
phrases  of  his  long  oratorical  career  did  not 
equal  the  sublimity  of  this  composure,  the 
pathos  of  this  silence. 

Augustus  one  day  caught  his  grandson  read- 
ing Cicero  by  stealth  :  "  Read  him,"  said  the 
man  who  had  been  Octavius,  "  read  him  without 
fear ;  he  was  a  great  man  who  loved  his  country 
well ! " 


54  THOUGHTS. 

Shame  to  the  ungrateful  triumvir !  Respect 
to  the  truthful  Emperor ! 

XXII. 

It  was  the  custom  in  Rome,  to  accompany 
the  exordium  of  orators  with  the  flute.  ...  So 
should  kindness  and  encouragement  always  aid 
those  who  make  their  first  appearances. 

XXIII. 

Those  who  try  to  speak  too  well,  always  have 
some  misgivings  as  to  the  manner  in  which 
they  have  spoken. 

XXIV. 

A  man  becomes  an  orator ;  he  is  born  elo- 
quent. 

XXV. 

God  has  given  you  a  beautiful  soul,  Optimus. 
Great  thoughts  flow  from  your  heart  as  from 
a  spring ;  your  mind  is  a  very  harmonious  instru- 
ment, which  every  suffering  and  every  joy  vies 
with  each  other  in  causing  to  vibrate.  When 
you  speak,  your  heart  is  heard  to  palpitate  upon 
your  lips.  Your  grave,  sonorous,  penetrating 
voice  agitates  like  a  chant  in  church  ;  it  lin- 
gers long  in  our  ear  like  the  murmur  of  the 
sea.  Never,  no,  never  shall  I  forget  our  last 
conversation.     My  breast  still  quivers,  my  eyelid 


ELOQUENCE,     ORATORS.  55 

is  still  moist  with  the  emotion  which  you  caused 
in  me.  Where  do  you  get  this  energy,  this  ten- 
derness, these  accents,  this  color  and  this  per- 
fume ?  Have  you  read  everything,  meditated 
everything,  sounded  everything?  In  the  most 
obscure  question,  you  pierce  openings  through 
which  the  light  streams.  Profound  and  subtle, 
ardent  and  calm,  austere  and  charming,  cold  and 
inspired,  you  have  within  you  two  men  who 
form  but  one,  superior  and  complete.  It  is  an 
honor  for  me  to  know  you,  a  happiness  to  see 
you.  O  Optimus,  may  I  be  not  too  unworthy 
to  speak  before  you,  to  think  like  you,  to  listen 
to  you,  and  to  understand  you !  God  loved  me 
on  that  day  when  I  met  you,  O  Optimus ! 

XXVI. 

A  too  exact  stenography  injures  a  discourse, 
as  a  too  faithful  photograph  injures  a  face.  In 
order  that  discourses  and  faces  should  "appear" 
beautiful  on  canvas  and  on  vellum,  they  must 
be  retouched. 

XXVII. 

Who  is  more  silent  than  Timaeus  before  the 
indifferent  ?  And  who  more  fluent,  I  will  even 
say  more  eloquent,  than  he,  when  he  can  pour 
out  his  soul  freely  ?  Timid  because  he  is  gentle, 
bold  because  he  is  strong,  he  offers  the  singular 
spectacle  of  two  contrary  characters.   The  battle 


56  THOUGHTS. 

which  he  will  win,  frightens  him.  Strife  causes 
him  horror  ;  and  yet,  what  energy,  what  ardor, 
what  valor,  he  will  display !  Arguments  throng 
to  his  lips.  His  brow  grows  lofty ;  his  nostrils 
dilate ;  his  eyes  dart  flames  ;  his  gesture,  always 
harmonious,  accompanies  the  movements  of  his 
thought,  the  movements  of  his  speech.  Who 
could  resist  so  much  force,  so  much  grace  ? 
His  adversaries,  happy  at  being  vanquished,  clap 
their  hands.  And  he  —  will  he  take  no  pride  in 
his  victory  ?  Observe  him  :  his  air  is  confused  ; 
he  has  but  one  fear,  that  he  has  caused  pain ; 
but  one  care,  to  obtain  pardon ;  and  he  must  be 
comforted. 

XXVIII. 

A  fertile  country  is  worth  nothing  without 
fine  roads  ;  a  great  deal  of  science  goes  for  little 
without  an  eloquent  tongue. 

XXIX. 

Is  Studio  a  learned  man  ?  I  make  a  distinc- 
tion. Studio  has,  to  be  sure,  acquired  a  certain 
science  ;  but  of  profound  science,  science  which 
is  broad  and  lofty,  good  and  true  science,  he 
has  none.  Studio  reads  day  and  night,  Studio 
toils  night  and  day ;  but  all  that  goes  into  his 
head  is  spoiled  there,  like  a  liquid  in  a  wretched 
cask.  A  troubled  brain,  an  adulterated  judg- 
ment,  an  unlucky   memory,  —  that   is    Studio. 


EL  O  Q  UENCE,     OR  A  TORS.  5  7 

Add  to  this,  a  very  heavy  tongue,  incapable  of 
saying  things  in  a  happy  manner. 

Nevertheless,  Studio  with  difficulty  conceals 
his  belief  that  he  is  a  paragon  of  eloquence. 

XXX. 

"Eloquence,"  replied  the  ancient  orator,  "is 
action,  still  action,  and  ever  action." 

Action  !  what  does  that  signify  ? 

Did  he  mean  gesture  ?  voice  ?  attitude  ?  bear- 
ing ?  delivery  ?  movement  of  ideas  ?  the  vivacity 
of  the  images  ?  the  vehemence  of  the  discourse  ? 
the  combined  effect  of  the  proofs  ?  the  order  of 
reasoning  ? 

Yes,  all  this  at  once. 

XXXI. 

Hoc  quod  continet  omnia  scientiam  habet  vocis 
(Eccl.). 

In  fact,  to  know  how  to  say  a  thing  is  the  sum 
of  the  whole  matter :  the  word  which  is  lan- 
guage, the  language  which  is  intelligence,  the 
created  intelligence  which  is  mind,  the  gift  of 
creative  mind  which  is  God. 

XXXII. 

Judith,  before  presenting  herself  before  Holo- 
fernes,  clothed  herself  in  her  richest  attire,  her 
bracelets,  her  earrings,  her  necklets,  her  rings, 


58  THOUGHTS. 

her  fillets  of  purple,    her  pins   of  gold.  .  .     In 
addition  to  this,  God  gave  her  splendor. 

Thus  the  orator  decks  himself  in  sentiments, 
thoughts,  images,  all  good  things,  without  doubt, 
but  powerless  without  the  Beautiful,  that  splen- 
dor of  the  True. 

xxxm. 

Extemporizers,  beware  of  extemporizing  repe- 
titions ! 

xxxiv. 

"A  priest  should  not  talk  politics  in  the 
pulpit.".  .  .  Yes.  Only  you  must  not  taint 
everything  with  politics  ;  otherwise,  nothing  will 
be  left  to  say. 

xxxv. 

When  orators  and  auditors  have  the  same  pre- 
judices, those  prejudices  run  a  great  risk  of  being 
made  to  stand  for  truths,  for  incontestable  truths. 

xxxvi. 
Is  not  an  eloquent  thing  always,  more  or  less, 
a  splendid  and  sonorous  thing  ? 

XXXVII. 

Thought  causes  one  to  understand,  the  image 
makes  one  see.  There  will  always  be  more  elo- 
quence in  the  image  than  in  thought. 

XXXVIII. 

Length  of  saying  makes  languor  of  hearing. 


III. 

HISTORY,    HISTORIANS. 


History,  if  thoroughly  comprehended,  fur- 
nishes something  of  the  experience  which  a 
man  would  acquire  who  should  be  a  contempo- 
rary of  all  ages  and  a  fellow-citizen  of  all  peoples. 


The  ancients  made  of  history  a  panegyric  ; 
we  have  made  of  it  a  libel. 

in. 

The  Emperor  Augustus,  when  seated  at  table 
between  Virgil,  who  was  asthmatic,  and  Horace, 
who  was  blear-eyed,  said,  laughing,  "  I  am  be- 
tween sighs  and  tears  !  " 

Alas  !  who  is  not  seated  between  these  two 
table-companions  at  the  banquet  of  life  ? 

IV. 

The  Greeks  said  to  strangers,  "  Barbarians  ! " 
The  strangers  retorted,  "  Children  !  " 


60  THOUGHTS. 

Are  not  we  Frenchmen  something  of  Greeks 
in  Europe  ? 

v. 

The  Jews,  writing  to  the  Spartans,  call  them 
brothers.  Who  are  these  Spartans  ?  The  Lace- 
demonians, without  a  doubt.  These  Lacedemo- 
nians, or  Laconians,  might  have  descended  from 
one  of  those  tribes  who  came  from  Egypt,  a 
country  long  inhabited  by  the  Hebrews  ;  or  from 
Phoenicia,  a  country  contiguous  to  the  Holy 
Land. 

Apropos  of  this,  might  not  the  Laconian 
tongue,  which  differed  so  widely  from  the  abun- 
dance of  other  dialects,  according  to  the  testimony 
of  the  Greeks,  be  a  congener  or  a  derivative  of 
Hebrew,  —  that  language  which  is  succinct  if 
ever  a  language  was  ?  Thus,  the  community 
of  genius  would  permit  us  to  conjecture  a  com- 
munity of  origin,  and  two  brother  peoples  might 
be  recognized  by  a  sister  tongue. 

Tacitus  makes  the  Jews  come  from  Ida,  the 
island  of  Crete  {Ida,  Idce,Jnd(zi).  A  misappre- 
hension big  with  mysteries. 

VI. 

Hannibal :  How  bold  he  is,  and  prompt,  and 
tenacious !  Desirous  of  killing  the  Roman 
power,  he  will  not  attack  it  at  its  extremities, 
he  will  strike  it  full  in  the  heart !     With  one 


HISTORY,  HISTORIANS.  6l 

bound  he  crosses  rivers  like  the  Ebro  and  the 
Rhone,  and  traverses  mountains  like  the  Pyre- 
nees and  the  Alps.  His  expedition  to  Italy  is 
no  adventure,  but  a  plan  of  campaign  which  he 
has  coldly  meditated,  and  which  he  will  reso- 
lutely accomplish.  Deprived  of  troops,  deserted 
by  Carthage,  he  camps  for  thirteen  years  in  the 
heart  of  Italy,  as  impregnable  in  defence  as  he 
was  irresistible  in  attack.  Alone  and  a  stranger, 
he  copes  with  a  whole  nation  fighting  on  its  own 
soil.  Conquered,  he  makes  his  conqueror  great 
without  becoming  less  himself.  A  fugitive,  he 
raises  levies  in  all  the  country  round  about 
Rome.  He  is  learned,  he  is  witty,  he  is  acute, 
he  is  ironical,  he  is  eloquent.  His  harangue  to 
the  senate  of  Carthage  is,  perhaps,  the  most 
solemn  and  most  pathetic  piece  which  the 
human  tongue  has  ever  uttered.  This  man 
weighs  down  the  breast  of  Rome.  Twenty  con- 
federated nations  would  not  alarm  the  Republic 
like  Hannibal  alone.  If  he  does  not  perish,  she 
is  not  sure  of  living.  Hannibal  deigns  to  die, 
and  Rome  utters  such  a  sigh  of  relief,  so  great 
a  cry  of  joy,  that  the  cry  and  the  sigh  make  the 
centuries  tremble ! 

VII. 

The  great  historians  of  Greece  and  Italy  are 
so  many  poets. 

What  is  Tacitus  ?     A  dramatic  poet. 


62  THOUGHTS, 

And  Titus  Livius  ?     An  epic  poet. 

And  old  Herodotus  ?     A  poet,  a  great  poet. 

Men  and  deeds  were  what  they  were ;  they 
are  for  us  what  the  historian  pleases. 

History  is  a  piece  played  by  whom  ?  By  dead 
heroes,  who  have  become,  thanks  to  the  writer, 
living  actors.  The  historian,  a  poet  by  virtue  of 
his  magic  art,  transforms  his  readers  into  ocular 
witnesses  of  the  things  which  he  relates. 

VIII. 

Tacitus  is  frightful  because  he  is  frightened. 

IX. 

The  words  of  Tacitus  seem  to  have  been 
drawn  from  Virgil  and  from  Horace ;  his 
phrases  have  the  air  of  disjointed  hexameters, 
disjecti  membra  poetce ;  they  might  be  taken 
for  verses  intended  to  be  put  back  into  form. 

This  poetical  style,  with  its  solemn  but  rather 
stiff,  rather  monotonous  gait,  with  a  supreme 
but  somewhat  affected  accent,  made  of  Tacitus 
a  writer,  and,  at  the  same  time  —  shall  I  say 
it  ?  a  wicked  author. 

x. 

What  is  not  pardoned  to  glory?  Caesar 
drowned  the  Gauls  in  blood,  and  the  Gauls 
loved  Caesar ;  Napoleon  opened  all  the  four  veins 
of  France,  and  the  French  adored  Napoleon ! 


HISTORY,  HISTORIANS,  63 

XI. 

Nothing  stains  and  nothing  cleanses  like 
blood. 

XII. 

In  order  to  judge  of  an  event,  it  is  necessary 
to  place  one's  self  at  a  distance,  as  it  is  in  order 
to  measure  a  building. 

XIII. 

"  The  philosophy  of  history  !  The  philosophy 
of  history  !  .  .  .  "  That  is  the  only  cry  that  is 
audible.  It  is  an  abuse.  When  will  it  be  said, 
"The  theology  of  history"  ? 

XIV. 

The  hero  arouses  wonder,  but  the  man  inter- 
ests. 

xv. 

Marius  was  nothing  but  a  brave  soldier  and  a 
good  general.  A  mediocre  politician  and  a 
mediocre  citizen,  he  showed  little  genius  and 
little  heart.  His  few  virtues  were  perhaps 
vices  which  had  not  had  time  to  develop  or 
the  occasion  to  expose  themselves.  His  great 
science  consisted  in  banishment.  Whoever, 
whether  in  war  or  peace,  opposed  obstacles  to 
him,  was  an  enemy  whom  he  set  about  destroy- 
ing. A  partisan  of  Sylla  was  a  Cimbrian  in  his 
eyes.    He  acknowledged  only  two  kinds  of  men, 


64  THOUGHTS. 

friends  and  enemies.  An  ambitious  egoism  was 
his  only  conscience,  his  only  rule  of  conduct. 
He  elevated  the  vilest  who  took  sides  with  him ; 
he  suppressed  the  noblest  who  opposed  him. 
"  Rome,"  "  Country,"  meant  nothing  to  him.  To 
rule,  to  rule  alone,  to  rule  no  matter  how,  to  rule 
before  and  against  all  men,  that  was  his  passion. 
Marius  was  an  indefatigable  and  pitiless  sword 
against  the  enemies  of  the  Roman  name,  which 
cut  them  down  or  expelled  them  ;  turned  against 
his  fellow-citizens,  that  sword  decimated  them 
to  such  a  point  that  there  remained  in  Rome 
only  a  small  number  of  people,  who  appeared 
shadows  of  men  and  of  Romans. 

XVI. 

Victus,  victima ;  fiostis,  hostia.  .  .  .  These 
etymologies  tell  more  about  the  cruel  Roman 
civilization  than  all  the  accounts  of  Titus 
Livius. 

XVII. 

Pompey,  born  a  patrician,  the  man  of  the 
aristocracy ;  Caesar,  also  born  a  patrician,  the 
man  of  the  democracy ;  Cicero,  plebeian  by 
birth,  a  patrician  by  education,  incessantly  be- 
tween Pompey  and  Caesar,  while  awaiting  the 
hour  to  founder  in  the  gulf  into  which  the  irres- 
olute man,  who  tries  to  keep  the  middle  between 
two  contrary  currents,  rarely  fails  to  fall. 


HISTORY,  HISTORIANS.  65 


XVIII. 

Augustus,  the  nephew  of  Julius  Caesar,  young, 
obscure,  inexperienced,  the  heir  of  a  name  which 
condemns  him  to  the  empire  of  the  world,  sys- 
tematically cruel,  will  be  the  scourge  of  the 
universe  until  the  day  when  he  can  become  its 
delight. 

What  matters  the  way  to  him  ?  The  goal  is 
all.  At  need,  he  will  exile  his  friends,  he 
will  elevate  his  adversaries.  Like  the  cork 
plunged  in  water,  he  will  strive  towards  the 
surface  with  all  his  nature.  By  as  much 
as  Octavius  was  ungrateful,  inexorable,  vindic- 
tive, by  so  much  will  Augustus  appear  full  of 
mildness,  I  will  even  say  of  good  nature. 
Who  immolates  Cicero,  and  pardons  Cinna  ? 
Who  covers  Italy  and  the  East  with  corpses, 
and  weeps  over  the  legions  of  Varus?  Who 
causes  the  slave  to  be  hung,  who  was  guilty  of 
having  eaten  a  roasted  quail,  and  saves  another 
slave  who  has  just  unintentionally  broken  the 
crystals  of  Vedius  Pollio  ?     Octavius,  Augustus. 

Thus  ambition  defeated  renders  men  fero- 
cious, and,  satisfied,  persuades  them  to  gentle- 
ness. Why  did  not  Octavius  possess  Rome  at 
his  birth  ?  He  would,  perhaps,  have  always 
been  Augustus. 


66  THOUGHTS, 


XIX. 


Polycrates,  on  finding  in  the  body  of  a  fish 
the  ring  which  he  had  flung  into  the  sea,  turns 
pale  with  fright.  Alexander's  Philip,  on  hear- 
ing, one  after  the  other,  three  pieces  of  good 
news,  implores  a  reverse.  Paulus  Emilius 
wishes  to  have  the  coffins  of  his  two  dead  chil- 
dren accompany  him  on  his  triumphal  way.  .  .  . 
Everywhere  is  distrust  of  fortune ;  everywhere 
a  disposition  to  fear  a  trap  of  the  perfidious  one. 
.  .  .  There  is  something  more  than  experience, 
something  more  than  hearsay,  in  this  ;  there  is 
an  inborn  feeling;  the  memory  of  some  great 
original  misfortune,  justly  inherited ;  the  un- 
conscious avowal  of  a  disobedience,  deserving  of 
chastisement,  not  of  favors.  .  .  .  Ausonius  pro- 
found for  this  once,  ably  summed  up  the  spirit 
of  antiquity  in  this  hemistich  :  — 
Fortunam  reverenter  habe. 

XX. 

The  Roman  Empire  held  its  peace  before 
Augustus ;  one  day  he  wished  to  impose  upon 
it  the  article,  which  is  lacking  in  Latin,  and  a 
universal  cry  arose;  Domitian  imposed  alpha- 
betical reforms  by  edicts,  and  there  was  no  one, 
from  consul  to  lictor,  who  did  not  burst  with 
laughter.      Chilperic   perpetrated   some    ortho- 


HISTORY,  HISTORIANS.  6? 

graphical  decrees,  which  aroused  more  indigna- 
tion than  the  abomination  of  that  husband  of 
Fr£degonde. 

Servility  indulges  in  these  unexpected  rebel- 
lions. 

XXI. 

Suetonius  recoils  before  no  detail ;  modesty- 
is  nothing  to  him  :  the  truth,  whatever  it  may 
be,  nothing  but  the  truth,  the  whole  truth,  naked 
in  history  as  in  the  fable  !  It  is  not  that  he  is 
shameless,  nor  indifferent  to  good  and  evil. 
Many  have  thought  so,  and  wrongly,  as  it  seems 
to  me.  Suetonius  always  distinguishes  between 
what  is  virtuous  and  what  is  vicious ;  only  he 
avoids  moralizing,  and  contents  himself  with 
exposing  the  facts,  in  order  that  the  reader,  the 
sole  judge,  may  pronounce  with  full  knowledge 
of  the  case.  Hence,  no  political  considerations, 
no  moral  reflections. 

Suetonius  does  not  relate  like  Titus  Livius, 
he  does  not  sing  like  Quintus  Curtius,  he  does 
not  reason  like  Sallust,  he  does  not  moralize 
like  Tacitus ;  Suetonius  reports  simply  and 
crudely  what  he  knows  through  having  seen  it 
or  learned  it.  He  lacks  dash,  depth,  and  scope  ; 
still  he  interests,  he'instructs,  he  causes  thought. 
The  historian  exhibits  but  little  genius,  no 
doubt,  but  the  relater  of  anecdotes  deserves 
well  of  posterity. 


68  THOUGHTS. 

XXII. 

Jeanne  d'Arc :  She  was  not  suffering  from 
"hallucinations."  She  was  not  an  "adventu- 
ress." Holy  voices  said  to  her,  "Quit  the  distaff; 
take  the  oriflamme  and  the  lance  !"  She  gives 
her  name,  she  offers  proofs.  Nothing  astonishes 
her,  neither  court,  nor  camp,  nor  field  of  battle. 
Those  who  are  in  command  obey  her.  A  cui- 
rass protects  her  bosom  and  her  heart.  Scoff- 
ers and  impudent  men  hold  their  peace ;  when 
this  young  girl  passes  on  horseback,  the  poor 
people  say,  "May  God  and  the  good  Virgin 
take  pity  on  the  kingdom  of  France  !  " 

The  Englishman  envelops  her  with  his  hate, 
the  Frenchman  with  his  love.  She  is  the 
"Saint,"  she  is  the  "Sorceress."  A  strange 
sorceress,  in  sooth,  who  delivers  her  country  by 
the  command  of  God.  Once  blood  tinges  her 
armor  ;  and  what  blood  is  it  ?  Her  own.  Her 
hand  is  raised  in  exhortation,  never  to  slay ! 
She  dies  as  she  has  lived,  like  a  woman,  a  hero, 
a  Christian. 

An  old  poet  says  that  she  reproduces  Hercu- 
les in  her  life  and  in  her  death  ;  a  rather  absurd 
comparison,  but  grandiose  and  striking.  Upon 
the  scaffold  she  weakens,  she  mourns  her  pure 
young  life  ;  the  fire  frightens  her  :  "  Mercy  ! " 
There  is  no  mercy,  and  she  becomes  resigned. 

I  have  seen  Jeanne  d'Arc  in  that  very  Rouen 


x HISTORY,  HISTORIANS.  69 

where  she  wept  because  she  must  die.  The 
statue  was  heavy  and  unpleasant,  without  human 
expression,  without  a  celestial  expression.  I 
saw  it  with  my  heart  most  of  all,  and  I  have 
always  shuddered  at  the  memory  of  it. 

The  Bishop  of  Orleans,  Alexander  Guillemin, 
and  Antoine  de  Latour  have  desired  for  the  vir- 
gin, for  the  warrior,  for  the  martyr,  yet  another 
glory,  —  that  of  the  canonized  saint.  This  fourth 
crown  will  blossom  on  her  brow  when  the  reign 
of  the  sons  of  Voltaire  shall  have  come  to  an  end. 

Stranger  lips  have  vied  in  chanting  the  "Good 
Lorrainese."  Bedford  and  Shakespeare  alone, 
of  all  England,  have  dared  to  hate  her  ;  Germany 
has  "filled  her  hands  with  lilies,"  that  is  to  say, 
with  hymns  and  poems  and  dramas ;  France, 
dishonored  blow  upon  blow  by  the  grotesque 
Chapelain  and  the  infamous  Arouet,  owes  the 
homage,  doubly  expiatory,  of  an  epic  to  her 
incomparable  child. 

XXIII. 

The  historian  must  be  a  poet ;  not  to  find, 
but  to  find  again  ;  not  to  breathe  life  into  beings, 
into  imaginary  deeds,  but  in  order  to  reanimate 
and  revive  that  which  has  been ;  to  represent 
what  time  and  space  have  placed  at  a  distance 
from  us. 

Scipio  Dupleix,  Daniel,  Rapin-Thoyras,  An- 


70  THOUGHTS. 

quetil,  etc.,  are  bad  historians  for  lack  of  being 
poets.  Even  that  which  is  authentic  is  not 
true  beneath  their  pens,  and  the  days  of  old 
die  over  again  under  their  unintelligent  hands. 
Thiers,  Lamartine,  Michelet,  Thierry,  etc.,  know- 
how  to  vivify ;  they  make  one  to  see,  hear,  and 
touch.  Not  only  do  they  resuscitate,  they  even 
create  at  times ;  and  they  divine  so  well  the  why 
and  the  how  of  everything,  that  one  can  sus- 
pect them,  like  the  commentator  Brossette,  of 
"knowing  Despr^aux  better  than  Despreaux 
knew  himself." 

XXIV. 

Christopher  Columbus :  Great  genius  and 
great  heart,  equal  to  his  prodigious  mission. 
Always  rebuffed,  always  persevering;  every- 
where misunderstood,  everywhere  faithful  to 
himself.  Reputed  by  turns  a  fool  and  impious, 
he  protests  in  the  name  of  reason  and  of  faith. 
Nothing  turns  him  aside ;  neither  ridicule,  nor 
arguments,  nor  calumnies,  nor  the  threats  which 
will  be  realized,  nor  the  promises  which  will 
never  be  realized.  Difficulties  without,  anguish 
within.  A  secret  voice  which  says  to  him, 
"  Courage  !  "  his  only  support. 

Introduced  by  a  monk  to  the  presence  of  the 
queen,  he  explains  his  project.  "A  new  world  ? 
How  can  it  exist  ?  Neither  the  ancients  nor  the 
moderns  have  ever  mentioned  it !  .  .  .  " 


HISTORY,  HISTORIANS.  Ji 

Sadly  he  takes  his  departure.  Whither  will 
he  go  ?  To  France,  to  face  more  ironies  ?  To 
England  ?  But  Isabella  hastens  towards  him. 
She  pledges  her  jewels.  Oh,  noble  woman, 
willed  also  in  the  plan  of  God  !  .  .  .  Columbus 
takes  to  the  sea. 

What  an  expedition !  Never  were  the  mar- 
vellous and  the  real  so  well  united  together! 
Will  he  reach  the  goal  ?  Will  that  world  which 
he  beholds  at  the  bottom  of  his  soul  spring  up 
before  his  eyes  ?  Without  doubt  that  world 
exists,  but  will  he  find  it  ?  .  .  .  Oh,  sleeplessness  ! 
oh,  anxiety  !  oh,  toil !  He  must  struggle  against 
everything  and  everybody :  against  the  elements, 
against  the  crew,  against  the  unknown.  This 
fleet  bears  the  fortune  of  a  world. 

At  length  he  cries,  "Land!  land!"  He 
leaps  upon  the  shore ;  he  falls  upon  his  knees ; 
he  raises  his  hands  to  heaven;  his  sword  re- 
mains in  its  sheath ;  the  standard  of  the  queen 
of  Spain,  the  cross,  the  banner  of  the  King  of 
kings,  nothing  else.     And  what  need  of  more  ? 

He  sails  towards  Spain  ;  with  him  envy  has 
embarked,  exasperated  by  so  much  glory.  In- 
gratitude forces  him,  as  indifference  in  former 
days,  to  wander  from  city  to  city  alone  with  his 
son,  whom  Lamartine,  in  an  inexcusable  fit  of 
abstraction,  blasts  with  the  title  of  bastard.  He 
has  given  twenty  Spains  to  Spain,  and  to  shelter 


72  THOUGHTS. 

himself  he  has  a  narrow  lodging !  He  has  dis- 
covered mines  of  gold  and  diamonds,  and  they 
haggle  with  him  for  a  bit  of  bread ! 

The  history  of  no  people  offers  a  contrast 
parallel  to  this.  Columbus,  at  the  point  of 
death,  possessing  no  longer  anything  but  a  cru- 
cifix to  remind  him  of  God,  and  a  trophy  of 
chains  to  remind  him  of  men,  bequeathing  by 
will  to  his  poor  son,  in  a  poor  "  posada  "  of  Val- 
ladolid,  his  titles  of  Viceroy  of  the  Seas  and 
Grand  Admiral  of  the  Indies  ! 

If,  at  least,  the  world  revealed  by  him  bore 
the  name  of  its  discoverer !  He  had  the  pain, 
another  has  the  profit.  May  God  have  opened 
His  paradise  to  the  great  Christian,  who  all  his 
life  toiled  laboriously  to  spread  Jesus  Christ  and 
the  Church  !  And,  finally,  may  Rome,  the  seat 
of  all  justice  and  source  of  all  consolation,  place 
upon  the  altars  the  man  who  aided  Peter  to 
accomplish  the  command  of  the  Gospel :  "  Go  ! 
teach  all  nations  !  " 

xxv. 

Danton  asks  pardon  of  God  and  of  men  for 
having  instituted  the  Revolutionary  Tribunal ; 
Jacques  Lafitte  asks  pardon  of  God  and  men  for 
having  established  the  government  of  July; 
Jules  Favre  asks  pardon  of  God  and  men  for 
having  stipulated  the  non-disarmament  of  the 
Parisian  militia.  .  .  . 


HISTORY,  HISTORIANS.  73 

Oh,  shortness  of  human  wisdom  !  Oh,  folly 
of  pride  and  vanity !  Thus  men  of  the  greatest 
talent,  wisdom,  and  experience  fall  with  both 
feet  and  open  eyes  into  the  snares  foreseen  by 
all,  ignored  by  themselves  alone. 

XXVI. 

Certain  names  always  awaken  certain  preju- 
dices. 

XXVII. 

Interests  desire  order ;  morals  give  it. 

XXVIII. 

Ninety-three !  All  the  monkeys  of  pagan 
Rome,  whose  dream  it  was  to  live  as  Romans 
of  the  Republic,  could  but  die  as  Romans  of 
the  Empire ;  that  is  to  say,  violently,  at  each 
other's  hands. 

XXIX. 

A  historian  minister  has  been  caught  talking 
like  a  historian  of  lazy  kings,  with  supreme  con- 
tempt, wishing  in  his  character  of  minister,  that 
kings  should  reign  and  not  govern. 

xxx. 

A  variety  of  bloods  is  necessary  in  nations,  as 
well  as  in  families,  for  the  health  and  well-being 
of  the  races. 


IV. 
MIND,  TALENT,  CHARACTER. 


The  conscience  of  the  man  who  is  given  over 
to  his  passions  is  like  the  voice  of  the  ship- 
wrecked mariner  overwhelmed  by  the  tempest. 

ii. 

Memory  is  an  impression  which  reverberates 
from  time  to  time  in  the  course  of  our  life. 

in. 

Sensible  men,  so  long  as  they  have  only  an 
experience  of  intuition  and  not  of  manipulation, 
will  not  fail  to  commit  follies.  They  would  like 
to  treat  the  matters  of  life  like  matters  of  the 
idea.  Hence  many,  disappointments.  Never- 
theless, after  a  few  lessons,  they  improve. 

IV. 

The  witty  man  is  reputed  malicious,  and,  in 
general,  wrongly.  He,  malicious?  Eh,  good 
heavens  I  smile  at  the  epigrams  which  he  lets 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  75 

fly  at  you,  and  out  of  gratitude  he  will  fall  upon 
your  neck ! 

v. 

There  is  no  humiliation  for  humility. 

VI. 

Imbeciles  and  malicious  people  hate  witty 
people.  The  malicious  say  that  the  witty  are 
imbecile,  and  the  imbecile  say  that  the  wits  are 
malicious. 

VII. 

In  the  matter  of  praise  we  consult  our  appe- 
tite more  than  our  health. 

VIII. 

However  much  light  there  may  be  in  a  mind, 
there  are  always  some  corners  which  remain  in 
shadow. 

IX. 

Epochs  of  decadence  multiply  that  singular 
contrast  of  a  fine  mind  and  a  vile  character. 


We  love  justice  greatly,  and  just  men   but 
little. 

XI. 

There  are  sterile  souls  where  nothing  germi- 
nates, neither  vices  nor  virtues. 


76  THOUGHTS. 


XII. 

The  fool  never  wishes  to  appear  ignorant  of 
what  he  is  being  taught,  nor  to  appear  not  to 
teach  you  that  which  he  is  ignorant  of. 

XIII. 

The  man  who  abstains  on  principle  from  flat- 
tering the  great  soon  renders  himself  suspected 
in  their  eyes. 

XIV. 

Much  prudence  does  not  always  keep  one 
from  committing  follies,  nor  much  sense  from 
thinking  them,  nor  much  wit  from  uttering 
them. 


xv. 


What  is  experience  ?  A  poor  little  hut  con- 
structed from  the  ruins  of  the  palace  of  gold  and 
marble  called  our  illusions. 

XVI. 

Are  the  talents  which  have  lost  their  virginity, 
and  afterwards  their  force,  rare  in  our  epoch  ? 

XVII. 

"Buried  alive!  .  .  ."  What  measures  are  not 
taken  to  prevent  such  a  peril  ?  But  there  are 
souls  which  are  buried  alive,  hearts  which  are 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  77 

buried  alive,  minds  which  are  buried  alive,  and 
who  troubles  himself  about  them  ? 

XVIII. 

It  is  said,  "  Wit  runs  the  streets."  In  truth, 
I  have  been  waiting  a  long,  long  time  to  see  it 
pass  by,  in  order  to  take  off  my  hat  to  it.  It  is 
as  rare  in  the  streets  as  in  the  drawing-room. 

XIX. 

Let  us  not  have  our  heads  in  our  hearts,  nor 
our  hearts  in  our  heads. 

xx. 

It  is  hard  work  to  argue  with  a  paltry  and 
supercilious  fool  in  the  presence  of  ignorant 
people.  How  are  we  to  set  about  establishing 
the  rights  of  reason  ?  Shall  we  address  our- 
selves to  our  man's  judgment  ?  Our  man  has 
no  judgment !  Shall  we  appeal  to  the  taste  of 
the  audience?  The  audience  is  lacking  in 
taste ! 

XXI. 

What  is  less  difficult  to  awaken  than  a  self- 
love  which  has  grown  drowsy  ?  What  more 
difficult  to  lull  to  sleep  again  than  a  self-love 
once  awakened  ? 

XXII. 

Pride  and  voluptuousness  engender  madness. 


78  THOUGHTS. 

XXIII. 
No  labor  is  hopeless. 

XXIV. 

There  is  a  frankness  which  is  brutal,  and  I 
detest  it ;  a  frankness  which  is  indiscreet,  and  I 
fear  it ;  a  foolish  frankness,  and  I  pity  it. 
There  is  also  a  frankness  which  is  opportune, 
delicate,  and  good  ;  honor  to  it ! 

xxv. 
We  are  more  conscious  that  a  person  is  in  the 
wrong  when  the  wrong  concerns  ourselves. 

XXVI. 

Happy  the  man  who  mortifies  the  bitter  pleas- 
ure of  crying  out  at  everything  which  wounds  or 
oppresses.  He  will  live  in  peace  with  others 
and  with  himself. 

XXVII. 

Ah  !  how  much  alone  is  a  virtuous  man ! 

XXVIII. 

Our  experience  is  composed  rather  of  illusions 
lost  than  of  wisdom  acquired. 

XXIX. 

I  call  a  certain  generative  faculty  "genius." 
{Genius,  generare.) 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  79 

XXX. 

"How  is  he?"  "Ill,  very  ill."  "But  the 
doctor  has  just  told  me  that  he  passed  a  good 
night,  and  that  perhaps.  .  .  ."  "  The  doctor  is 
mistaken."  "But  who  assures  you?  .  .  ."  "I 
know  by  a  certain  sign  that  he  is  lost :  Vecors 
js  mourning  aloud,  Vecors  his  favorite,  his 
creature,  — and   that   ever  since  yesterday  !  " 

XXXI. 

A  king,  surrounded  by  his  court,  was  seated 
beside  the  highway.  Savoir-faire  came  along. 
"Who  are  you?"  asked  the  king.  Savoir-faire 
replied,  "  I  am  not  much  of  anything.  If  you 
think  good,  I  can  be  a  great  deal.  Say  the  word, 
and  I  shall  have  talent,  wisdom,  power,  all  that 
I  desire  to  make  myself  agreeable  to  you."  — 
"  Remain,"  said  the  king. 

Then  Knowledge  (Savoir)  passes.  The  king 
in  his  abstraction  did  not  perceive  him.  "  King, 
Knowledge  !  "  cried  a  courtier.  Knowledge,  with 
a  humble  mien  and  trembling  lip,  approaches. 
"  Sire,  my  words  are  straightforward,  my  heart 
is  true,  my  hand  is  just.  Take  me  into  your 
employ  :  I  shall  be  of  service  to  you." 

The  king  replied,  "  Away,  proud  creature  ! " 

XXXII. 

Our  character  often  makes  our  conscience. 


80  THOUGHTS. 

XXXIII. 

He :  "  I  have  been  owing  you  for  more  than 
a  year ;  I  wish  to  pay  my  debt. . . .    What  is  it  ?  " 

The  workman  :  "Twenty-five  francs,  sir." 

He  :  "Twenty-five  francs  ?  Oh !  Oh ! . . .  Let 
it  go  at  twenty  francs." 

The  workman  :  M  My  account  is  just,  sir ! 
Merchandise  is  dear,  work  is  at  a  standstill,  and 
workmen  are  scarce,  so  scarce !  .  .  ." 

He :  "I  have  said  twenty,  and  I  stick  to 
that." 

The  workman  :  "  I  am  sorry.  .  ." 

He  :  "  It  is  an  insult !  My  friends  shall  know 
about  you  !  "     (He  opens  his  purse.) 

A  beggar  (half  opening  the  door)  :  "  Charity, 
gentlemen  ! " 

He  :  "  Capital !  .  .  .  It  shall  not  be  said  that  I 
have  the  shame  and  you  the  profit  (tossing  a 
Louis  d'or  to  the  workman  and  a  five-franc  piece 
to  the  beggar).     "Take  that,  and  begone." 

The  beggar :  "  Five  francs  !  Oh,  the  good 
man  ! " 

XXXIV. 

Salt  sprinkled  on  the  earth  renders  it  sterile ; 
mixed  with  the  soil,  it  renders  it  fruitful. 

xxxv. 
Experience  teaches  the  good  that  there  are 
wicked   people,  and  the  wicked  that  there  are 
good  people. 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  8 1 

XXXVI. 

"  Every  sincere  opinion  is  worthy  of  respect." 
...  I  make  a  distinction  :  the  sincerity  is  a  thing 
worthy  of  respect.  The  opinion  ...  if  it  is  vir- 
tuous, yes  ;  if  not,  no. 

XXXVII. 

Our  judgments  are  inspired  by  our  acts  more 
than  our  acts  by  our  judgment. 

XXXVIII. 

How  many  sacrifice  honor,  a  necessity,  to 
glory,  a  luxury ! 

XXXIX. 

People  who  are  calumniated  are  like  fruits. 
They  are  bitten  ;  therefore  they  are  good. 

XL. 

Imitation  is  a  necessity  of  nature ;  when 
young,  we  imitate  others  ;  when  old,  ourselves. 

XLI. 

The  good  hate  evil,  but  not  evil  people ;  the 
evil  abhor  both  good  and  good  people. 

XLII. 

Yesterday  I  plucked  up  some  plants  and  flung 
them  on  the  dung-heap.  ...  I  found  them  this 
morning  blossoming  and  smiling. 


82  THOUGHTS. 

Thus  do  beautiful  souls  flourish  under  humili- 
ation. 

XLIII. 

The  foolhardy  man  prevails  there  and  now ; 
the  prudent  man  in  the  long  run  and  every- 
where. 

XL1V. 

This  lower  world  must  be  traversed  as  ship- 
wrecked mariners  traverse  the  sea,  with  head 
above  the  billows,  eye  and  arms  towards  the 
shore. 

XLV. 

An  undisputed  merit  finds  no  great  difficulty 
in  appearing  modest. 

XLVI. 

Success  causes  us  to  be  more  praised  than 
known. 

XLVII. 

The  cause  of  good  has  against  it  both  the 
vicious  who  combat  it,  and  the  just  who  defend 
it  badly  or  not  at  all. 

XLVIII. 

You  have  talent  ?  Possibly !  But  do  you 
make  the  most  of  it  ?  That  is  to  say,  do  you 
exert  yourself,  more  or  less,  according  to  times, 
places,  and  people  ?     If  you  simply  intend,  but 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  83 

do  not  exert  yourself,  your  talent  will  probably 
profit  no  one,  and  it  certainly  will  not  profit  you. 

XLIX. 

"  The  air  which  the  body  can  breathe  does  not 
extend  very  high,"  say  the  physicists.  .  .  . 

The  air  which  the  soul  can  breathe  here  be- 
low is  still  less  abundant. 


If  a  great  personage  of  lowly  birth  commits  a 
base  action,  "  He  forgets  himself,"  more  than 
one  will  say.     Eh  !  no,  he  recollects  himself ! 

LI. 

"  Simple,  innocent,  candid,  na'ff."  These 
words  take  a  sense  which  make  one  smile  in 
exact  proportion  as  public  morals  take  a  turn 
which  makes  one  weep. 

LII. 

The  subtle  mind  excels  in  giving  reasons  for 
a  thing ;  the  penetrating  mind,  in  finding  their 
reasons. 

LIII. 

Our  soul,  which  the  world  pretends  to  divert 
with  its  vanities,  resembles  the  child  which  is 
consoled  by  the  offer  of  a  rattle  in  lieu  of  a  star. 


84  THOUGHTS. 


LIV. 

Is  it  you  who  are  barking  so,  Molossus  ? 
What  has  been  done  to  you  ?  You  fly  into  a 
fury  at  everything,  at  the  wind,  the  rain,  the 
sun.  .  .  .  Your  tongue  is  a  lash  which  is  always 
raised,  always  resounding.  May  the  saints  of 
paradise  preserve  me  from  your  wrath!  It 
bursts  forth  more  oquickly  than  the  thunder, 
more  abundantly  than  the  storm,  more  impetu- 
ously than  the  hurricane.  It  shakes,  it  twists, 
it  uproots,  it  carries  away,  it  disperses !  The 
less  cause  it  has,  the  more  effect  does  it  pro- 
duce. In  truth,  you  are  no  longer  a  reasonable 
being,  you  are  an  element.  You  have  no  regard 
for  any  one,  you  respect  nothing.  You  set  out ; 
your  gallop  is  accelerated  by  the  speed  acquired ; 
and  you  strike  blindly,  cut  and  thrust,  to  right, 
to  left,  above,  below,  far  and  near,  at  random  ! 
Who  could  flatter  himself  at  finding  mercy 
before  you,  implacable  man  ?  You  want  all  to 
hold  the  same  reason,  your  own ;  you  want  all 
to  have  the  same  character,  the  same  senti- 
ments, your  own,  always  your  own.  Woe  to 
him  who  opposes  you  with  an  if,  a  but,  a  smile, 
a  gesture,  a  silence  !  You  sacrifice  him  on  the 
instant  to  the  Furies.  Thus  your  aspect  terri- 
fies, Molossus.  Mothers  flee  in  desperation,  on 
perceiving  your  approach ;   and  little  children 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  85 

take  flight,  in  terror  amid  tears  and  cries  of 
"the  bugaboo!  .  .  ." 

LV. 

Who  suffers  more,  the  capable  man  who  is  at 
the  bottom  and  who  should  be  at  the  top,  or  the 
mediocre  man  who  is  at  the  top  and  ought  to  be 
at  the  bottom  ? 

LVI. 

It  is  not  as  far  from  the  heart  to  the  mouth, 
as  it  is  from  the  mouth  to  the  hand. 

LVII. 

We  all  boast  of  something :  one  of  his  ances- 
tors, another  of  his  alliances,  one  of  his  face, 
another  of  his  mind,  another  of  his  heart,  one 
of  his  hopes,  one  of  his  disappointments,  one 
of  his  fortune,  another  of  his  poverty,  one  of 
his  virtues,  another  of  his  vices.  .  .  .  That  man 
who  boasts  of  not  boasting  is  not  the  one  who 
boasts  the  least. 

LVIII. 

The  violet  beneath  the  grass,  the  nightingale 
amid  the  foliage,  the  genius  who  has  patience, 
the  virtue  which  hides  itself,  —  these  are  four 
charming  things. 

LIX. 

What  virtue  is  not  indispensable  to  the  witty- 
man,  to  enable  him  to  deny  himself  the  pleasure 


86  THOUGHTS. 

of  a  malicious  hit  ?  Jean  Racine,  at  the  mo- 
ment of  his  greatest  fervor,  bit  his  lips  until 
they  bled,  in  order  to  restrain  a  sally. 

LX. 

Genius  makes  its  way  with  so  much  difficulty, 
because  this  lower  world  is  in  the  hands  of  two 
omnipotences,  —  that  of  the  wicked,  and  that  of 
the  fools. 

LXI. 

What  is  a  virtuous  man  ?  Some  one  who 
possesses  a  perfect  whole  of  religious,  social, 
and  domestic  virtues,  perfumed  with  delicacy. 

LXII. 

Our  sentiments,  our  thoughts,  our  words,  lose 
their  rectitude  on  entering  certain  minds,  just 
as  sticks  plunged  in  the  water  look  bent. 

LXIII. 

We  amend  our  defects  less  than  our  good 
qualities. 

LXIV. 

The  irresolute  man  blesses  the  necessity 
which  will  absolve  him  from  taking  any  side 
whatever. 

LXV. 

If  you  have  neither  virtues  nor  vices,  rejoice; 
you  will  be  called  good  :   if  you  lack  wit  and 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  Zj 

imagination,  be  comforted  ;  you  will  be  consid- 
ered sensible  and  "practical." 

LXVI. 

That  which  puts  the  last  touch  to  the  perver- 
sion of  the  wicked  man,  finishes  the  conversion 
of  the  good  one. 

LXVII. 

What  is  slander  ?  A  verdict  of  "  guilty " 
pronounced  in  the  absence  of  the  accused,  with 
closed  doors,  without  defence  or  appeal,  by  an 
interested  and  prejudiced  judge. 

LXVIII. 

All  which  bars  his  road  gives  way,  willingly 
or  unwillingly,  before  the  man  of  talent  who  no 
longer  goes  alone. 

LXIX. 

We  thrive  on  evil  for  a  time,  in  order  that  it 
may  the  more  surely  ruin  us  in  the  end. 

LXX. 

This  man  has  his  defects ;  yet  he  cherishes 
truth  and  defends  justice.  And  petty  souls 
exclaim :  "  Oh,  the  inconsistency !  Oh,  the 
scandal !  .  .  ."  But  pious  hearts  say  :  "  Oh, 
the  native  nobility  of  the  man !  oh,  the  happy 
contradiction  of  the  Christian  ! " 


88  THOUGHTS. 

LXXI. 

The  wicked  man  has  two  ways  of  injuring,  — 
by  doing  good,  and  by  doing  evil. 

LXXII. 

When  the  tongue  puts  itself  at  ease,  it  puts 
everything  else  under  constraint. 

LXXIII. 

A  multitude  of  things  awake  in  us  at  first 
.sight  a  sensation  which  seems  to  be  memory. 

LXXIV. 

Very  few  men  are  capable  of  judging.  "The 
general  opinion  "  is  often  merely  the  opinion  of 
a  few  accepted  by  all. 

LXXV. 

A  tree  with  lofty  head  has  less  shade  at  its 
foot. 

LXXVI. 

Too  many  social  or  literary  conventionalities 
prevent  one's  being  "one's  self,"  either  as  a  citi- 
zen or  as  a  writer. 

LXXVII. 

A  man  makes  his  way  better  with  agreeability 
without  merit,  than  with  merit  without  agreea- 
bility. 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  89 

LXXVIII. 

Fortuna  had,  formerly,  only  the  meaning  of 
luck,  chance,  opportunity ;  to  these  we  have 
added  the  meaning,  riches ;  "  to  possess  a  great 
fortune.  .  .  ."  Facultates  signified  "pecuniary 
resources,"  alone ;  it  no  longer  designates  any- 
thing but  the  "  powers  "  of  the  mind.  Never- 
theless, the  expression  is  good,  "To  give  ac-< 
cording  to  one's  powers." 

LXXIX. 

The  world  constitutes  itself  the  judge  and  the 
executioner  of  whomsoever  sacrifices  his  con- 
science to  it. 

LXXX. 

Conscientious  men  are,  almost  everywhere, 
less  encouraged  than  tolerated. 

LXXXI. 

One  sort  of  humility  springs  from  pride ;  one 
sort  of  pride  springs  from  humility. 

LXXXII. 

He  who  says,  "  I  have  done  wrong,"  however 
wicked  he  may  be,  could  be  more  so. 

LXXXIII. 

How  many  are  there  who  do  not  sin  from  lack 
of  desire  or  lack  of  occasion  ? 


90  THOUGHTS. 


LXXXIV. 

The  folly  which  we  might  have  ourselves  com- 
mitted is  the  one  which  we  are  least  ready  to 
pardon  in  another. 

LXXXV. 

The  man  of  talent  who  is  born  poor,  can 
neither  take  care  of  himself,  look  out  for  him- 
self, nor  place  himself  where,  when,  and  as  he 
should.  Daily  bread  solicits  his  attention  first 
of  all,  and  holds  him  captive  from  the  beginning. 
He  cannot  live  according  to  his  mind,  except  at 
"leisure"  hours,  by  hiding  himself,  and  com- 
promising himself.  Possessing  neither  complete 
liberty,  complete  independence,  complete  ease, 
nor  complete  respect,  he  runs  a  great  risk,  if  he 
arrives  at  the  goal  at  all,  of  arriving  old  and 
way-worn. 

LXXXVI. 

When  those  who  can  and  ought  to  do  us  good 
content  themselves  with  paying  us  off  in  so- 
norous compliments,  let  us  console  ourselves 
with  the  thought  that  we  are  superior  to  them 
by  the  whole  depth  of  their  baseness. 

LXXXVII. 

A  whole  heaven  is  contained  in  a  drop  of  dew, 
a  whole  soul  within  a  tear. 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  91 

LXXXVIII. 

It  is  a  very  rare  thing  for  a  man  of  talent  to 
succeed  by  his  talent. 

LXXXIX. 

We  are  never  well  served  except  by  that  which 
we  support  well. 

xc. 

Dignities  are  fruitful ;  dignity,  alas  !  is  sterile. 

xci. 

The  lion  in  his  cage  must  have  his  bow-wows, 
and  the  despot  in  his  palace,  his  fussy  little 
minds  and  flatterers. 

xcn. 

The  same  clouds  which  grew  thick  and  dark 
to  prevent  the  sun  from  shining,  clothe  them- 
selves in  sjuppleness  and  transparency  when  the 
sun  has  forced  them  to  make  way  for  him. 

XCIII. 

There  is  a  slowness  in  affairs  which  ripens 
them,  and  a  slowness  which  rots  them. 

xciv. 

The  philosopher  spends  in  becoming  a  man 
the  time  which  the  ambitious  man  spends  in 
becoming  a  personage. 


92  THOUGHTS. 

XCV. 

Reason !  reason  !  .  .  .  As  much  as  you  like  ; 
but  beware  of  thinking  that  it  answers  to  every- 
thing, suffices  for  everything,  satisfies  every- 
thing. This  mother  loses  her  child :  will  reason 
comfort  her?  Does  cool  reason  counsel  the 
inspired  poet,  the  heroic  warrior,  the  lover? 
Reason  guides  but  a  small  part  of  man,  and  that 
the  least  interesting.  The  rest  obeys  feeling, 
true  or  false,  and  passion,  good  or  bad. 

xcvi. 

Satan,  having  one  day  convoked  his  grand 
council,  the  ministers  of  hell,  when  on  the  point 
of  taking  their  places  Abated  the  question  of 
precedence. 

"  The  place  on  my  right  to  the  most  worthy  !  " 
exclaimed  Satan. 

Lust  pleaded  his  right ;  Falsehood  asserted 
his  title ;  Pride  vaunted  his  merits. 

Satan  listened  in  indecision. 

Sarcasm  gave  vent  to  a  grin,  and  said  :  u  No 
one  is  more  worthy  than  I,  Satan.  The  evil 
which  these  do  is  little  compared  with  what  I 
know  how  to  effect.  One  can  correct  himself 
of  all  of  them,  but  one  can  never  free  himself 
from  me :  they  ruin  individuals,  I  destroy  em- 
pires ;  they  encourage  vice,  I  discourage  virtue. 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  93 

Through  me,  enthusiasm  expires,  justice  suc- 
cumbs, truth  becomes  afraid,  duty  ashamed. 
Devisor  perdet  civitatem.  ..." 

"  Come,  seat  thyself  beside  me  !  "  said  Satan. 

xcvu. 

On  earth  we  obtain  nothing  without  effort ; 
how,  without  virtue,  shall  we  attain  glory  in 
heaven  ? 

XCVIII. 

Reason  is  habitual,  secondary  inspiration ; 
inspiration  is  superior,  intermittent  reason. 

xcix. 

Like  those  statues  which  must  be  made  larger 
than  "  nature  "  in  order  that,  viewed  from  below, 
or  from  a  distance,  they  may  appear  to  be  of 
the  "  natural "  size,  certain  truths  must  be 
"  strained  "  in  order  that  the  public  may  form  a 
just  idea  of  them. 

c. 

What  is  a  day  without  sun,  or  a  man  without 
goodness  ? 

ci. 

Ah !  how  little  we  know  those  who  know  us 
best. 

en. 

A  brain  without  judgment  is  like  a  carriage 
badly  hung,  which  upsets  on  the  way. 


94  THOUGHTS. 


cm. 


Pervicax  has  been  studying,  observing,  writ- 
ing these  thirty  years  to  no  purpose.  With  the 
exception  of  two  or  three  who  suspect  his  worth 
and  hold  their  peace,  no  one  takes  Pervicax  seri- 
ously. "But  if  he  possessed  merit,  the  masters 
would  salute  him  in  the  sight  of  all !  .  .  ." 

But  behold  homage  comes  from  above  and 
afar  to  seek  Pervicax  in  the  depths  of  his  isola- 
tion. 

"  Really  ?  .  .  .  Such  a  surprise !  .  .  .  Thq 
man  has  talent,  it  must  be  confessed.  .  .  ." 

And  in  one  day  Pervicax  becomes  a  prophet ; 
a  prophet  in  his  own  country!  He  is  sur- 
rounded, admired,  glorified.  Some  pamphlet 
which  he  published  fifteen  years  ago  amid  uni- 
versal indifference  is  lauded  ;  some  college  com- 
position in  which  his  genius  began  to  dawn  is 
exhumed ;  his  latest  work  is  placed  upon  the 
table  by  itself,  with  a  paper-knife  between  the 
leaves ;  "  it  will  be  read  page  by  page  with 
delight,  as  it  deserves ;  his  ideas,  his  style,  are 
charming !  .  .  ."  Thus  Pervicax  enters  upon 
his  triumphal  path.  The  time  for  the  shrugging 
of  shoulders,  for  sly  looks  and  heart-rending 
smiles  is  past.  Everything  has  changed  its 
aspect,  and  the  stones  which  were  hurled  at 
him  must  now  be  placed  in  orderly  fashion,  and 


MIND,    TALENT,    CHARACTER.  95 

a  pedestal  must  be  constructed  of  them  for  the 
statue  which  is  being  prepared  for  him. 

civ. 
Generosity  is  more  charitable  than  wealth. 

cv. 
In  a  brilliant  position  a  piece  of  folly  speedily 
creates  a  sensation. 

cvi. 

Let  those  talk  who  assert  that  in  order  to 
speak  with  knowledge  of  a  passion  of  the  heart, 
it  is  necessary  to  have  shared  it.  O,  thou  who 
art  chaste,  remain  chaste.  Study  vice  outside 
thyself ;  it  is  enough.  Do  not  become  impure 
in  order  to  know.  To  graft  good  upon  evil  is 
divine ;  to  graft  evil  upon  good  would  be  Satanic. 
Teach  us  by  experience,  O,  converted  libertine, 
what  a  misery  sin  is ;  thou  canst  do  it,  and  it 
is  thy  duty.  And  you,  snow  without  a  spot, 
sweet-scented  lily,  if  you  renounce  your  white- 
ness, what  will  you  be  good  for?  To  enlarge 
the  dung-heap  in  the  corner. 

cvn. 
All  has  not  been  discovered  in  the  firmament 
of  ideas.  The  sons  of  Galileo  and  Herschel 
every  year  point  out  some  planet  unknown  in 
this  quarter  of  the  universe ;  why  should  not 
the  disciples  of  Descartes  and  Leibnitz  find  in 


g6  THOUGHTS. 

some  corner  of  the  brain,  in  some  fold  of  the 
heart,  a  star,  very  ancient,  since  it  would  date 
from  God  ;  and  very  new,  since  it  has  beamed 
upon  our  horizon  only  yesterday  ? 

Silence,  philosopher ;  priest,  resignation. 

CVIII. 

Repress  a  certain  disposition  to  treat  as  ene- 
mies those  who  do  not  believe,  pray,  think,  act, 
nor  speak  as  thou  dost. 

cix. 
It  is  impossible  to  be  just  if  one  is  not  gen- 
erous. 

ex. 

The  Revolutions  of  Sweden  made  a  great 
noise  at  their  birth.  The  Swedish  ambassador 
was  ordered  to  offer  the  author  a  pension  and 
the  cross.  "  The  Abb£  Vertot  ? "  he  inquired 
at  the  court  of  Versailles.  "  Not  known  here." 
"The  Abbe  Vertot?"  he  asked  of  the  Acad- 
emy ;  the  same  reply.  He  seeks  the  editor : 
"Can  you  tell  me  where  the  Abb6  Vertot 
lives  ? "  "In  a  village  between  Paris  and 
Melum."  "  With  whom  ? "  "  At  home,  in  the 
parsonage.  The  Abbe  Vertot  is  a  simple  coun- 
try cure."  "Ho!  that  makes  a  difference!" 
And  the  ambassador  pocketed  the  purse  and 
the  decoration. 

Only  those  who  have,  receive. 


V. 
JOY,   SUFFERING,    FORTUNE. 


What  prince  of  Europe  or  of  Asia,  seeking 
throughout  the  whole  of  his  vast  empire  for  a 
happy  man,  found  him  at  last  in  the  skin  of  a 
poor  wretch  who  had  no  shirt  ?  Felicissimus 
has  a  shirt,  and  more,  thank  God,  but  in  spite 
of  that,  Felicissimus  is  certainly  the  happiest 
man  beneath  the  canopy  of  heaven.  Listen  to 
him,  look  at  him,  apropos  of  everything,  not  to 
say  of  nothing.  Joy  beams  from  his  eyes,  over- 
flows from  his  lips,  wells  up  from  his  heart  to 
gush  forth  far  and  near,  all  around  him.  Every 
one  honors  him,  distinguishes  him,  is  his  friend. 
The  slightest  word,  the  slightest  piece  of  polite- 
ness, covers  him  with  glory.  A  mere  nothing 
becomes  gold  by  passing  through  his  mouth. 
The  entire  universe  gravitates  towards  him  and 
revolves  about  him.  "  I  have  just  dined  with 
my  friend,  the  ambassador;  I  have  received  a 
visit  from  my  comrade  Z,  .  .  .  the  deputy ;  the 
poet  X  .  .  .  wishes  to  render  homage  to  me  in  a 


98  THOUGHTS. 

poem  he  is  composing,  etc."  There  is  no  great 
personage  who  does  not  seek  him,  who  does  not 
consult  him.  ...  If  Felicissimus  has  a  regret 
(which  takes  nothing  from  his  beatitude),  it  is 
that  he  is  not  able  to  multiply  himself,  to  suffice 
for  the  love  of  all.  Life,  for  him,  is  a  perpetual 
banquet,  where  he  is  suffocated  under  roses. 

Let  us  not  be  jealous  of  Felicissimus ;  let  us 
rather  admire  him,  since  he  does  not  wish  to  be 
pitied. 

ii. 

Nothing  vivifies,  and  nothing  kills,  like  the 
emotions. 

in. 

Great  joys  weep,  great  sorrows  laugh. 

IV. 

Present  unhappiness  is  selfish ;  past  sorrow  is 
compassionate. 

v. 

Let  us  prefer,  let  us  not  exclude. 

VI. 

A  certain  sadness  constitutes  a  refinement  of 
pleasure,  which  is  peculiar  to  pride. 

VII. 

The  passions  have  a  certain  something,  I 
know  not  what,  about  them,  which  always 
tempts,  and  which  never  contents. 


JOY,   SUFFERING,  FORTUNE.  99 

VIII. 
At   first   we   hope   too  much,  later   on,   not 
enough. 

IX. 

Hope  deceives,  enjoyment  undeceives. 

x. 

One  day  everything  breaks  and  crumbles, 
another  day  everything  rises  again. 

XI. 

Few  know  how  to  suffer,  from  lack  of  heart ; 
or  how  to  enjoy,  for  lack  of  mind. 

XII. 

Press  anything  you  will,  a  groan  will  issue 
forth. 

XIII. 

Trees  assume,  on  the  approach  of  winter,  an 
air  of  anguish,  an  accent  of  desolation  which 
are  thrilling.  One  would  say  that  all  these 
leaves  were  struggling  before  they  fall  and  die. 

XIV. 

Many  conditions  are  necessary  for  happiness, 
which  are  rarely  encountered  together. 

xv. 
He  who  does  not  appreciate  does  not  possess. 


100  THOUGHTS. 


XVI. 


We  shall  know  whether  we  have  been  happy, 
we  do  not  know  if  we  are  so. 


XVII. 

"  I  was  ignorant,  I  was  happy ! "...  all  proud 
spirits,  anxious  to  ignore,  more  anxious  to  know, 
breathe  forth  this  cry  of  pain,  since  Adam,  the 
first  who  desired  and  the  first  who  was  deceived. 

XVIII. 

Does  he  desire  a  thing?  It  is  with  all  his 
heart.'  Neither  appetite  nor  sleep  will  divert 
him  from  it.  .  .  .  Frustrated,  he  is  disenchanted. 
The  news  of  a  success  long  waited  for  in  vain, 
finds  him  indifferent.  In  everything,  sponta- 
neity, opportuneness,  alone  are  sweet  to  him. 

XIX. 

We  abandon  ourselves  to  revery,  before  our 
eyes  first  flit  fantastic  forms.  We  almost  see 
them  ;  they  seem  to  have  a  body ;  they  turn, 
they  withdraw,  they  return,  like  the  butter- 
flies which  play  about  a  lamp ;  they  caress  our 
imagination  with  the  tip  of  their  wing.  Little  by 
little  our  fancy  strays  among  the  folds  of  a  con- 
fused and  fluttering  veil.  Our  eyes  dilate  and 
become  fixed,  gazing  but  seeing  nothing.  .  .  . 


JOY,   SUFFERING,  FORTUNE.  10 1 

Let   some   one   come,  we    start   up   as  though 
awakened  from  the  midst  of  a  dream. 

xx. 

There  are  days  when  we  permit  ourselves  to 
be  invaded  by  great  waves  of  sadness.  Our 
mind  becomes  cast  down,  our  will  succumbs, 
our  soul  leaves  us.  We  think  we  are  no  longer 
free.  Our  energy  seems  fettered  hand  and 
foot.  We  have  no  longer  either  force  or  desire 
to  do  anything.  We  regard  ourselves  with 
amazement,  sometimes  with  pity.  Happy  are 
we  if  tears  come  to  our  aid !  .  .  .  But  this  arid 
and  silent  malady  dries  the  eyelids  after  having 
dried  up  the  heart.  Body  and  soul  become  sus- 
ceptible to  the  highest  degree ;  the  light  pains 
us,  we  seek  the  shadow;  the  human  voice 
wearies  us,  we  bury  ourselves  in  silence ;  social 
life  is  a  burden,  we  embrace  solitude ;  we  live 
with  difficulty,  as  a  wicked  man  lives  with  his 
remorse.  We  eat  our  hearts  out  at  pleasure.  .  .  . 
Terrible  trial !  What  poison  can  be  compared 
to  that  virus  which  chills  and  consumes  ;  which 
paralyzes,  pulverizes,  and  dissolves ;  which  dis- 
suades us  from  virtue,  and  disgusts  us  with 
generosity;  which  renders  us  enemies  of  our- 
selves and  of  every  one  else. 

We  detach  ourselves  from  what  we  love  the 
most,  willingly,  coldly,  obstinately.     We  display 


102  THOUGHTS. 

lamentable  ingenuity  in  destroying  our  own 
happiness  of  memory  or  hope.  Every  sweet 
word  returns  to  us  like  a  bitter  after-taste  ;•  all 
devoted  service,  every  flattering  distinction, 
every  delicate  attention  produces  upon  us  the 
effect  of  an  irony. 

We  bear  our  torture  about  with  us,  and  when 
it  is  necessary  to  smile,  the  lips  assume  sinister 
folds.  .  .  .  And  we  exaggerate  this  evil  which  is 
already  so  great,  with  a  cruel  pleasure.  If  such 
a  disorder  were  lasting !  woe,  ah !  yes,  woe  to 
us !  but  God  at  whom  we  are  sulking  (for  this 
strange  nightmare  sets  us  against>.  God  also), 
does  not  hold  us  sternly  to  our  proud  infirmity ; 
and  in  order  to  snatch  us  from  the  peril,  he 
sends  us  either  an  all-powerful  consolation  or  a 
real  sorrow. 

XXI. 

Pleasure  once  tasted  satisfies  less  than  the 
desire  experienced  for  it  torments. 

XXII. 

Say  nothing  good  of  yourself,  you  will  be  dis- 
trusted ;  say  nothing  bad  of  yourself,  you  will 
be  taken  at  your  word. 

XXIII. 

Those  men  whose  backs  are  so  elastic  in 
bending  before  you,  in  the  hour  of  your  pros- 


JOY,   SUFFERING,   FOXTUJVF.  103 

perity,  will  find  them  just  as  elastic  for  straight- 
ening up  against  you  in  the  day  of  your 
adversity. 

XXIV. 

Since  unhappiness  excites  interest,  many,  in 
order  to  render  themselves  interesting,  feign 
unhappiness. 

xxv. 

The  chief  cause  of  our  misery  is  less  the  vio- 
lence of  our  passions  than  the  feebleness  of  our 
virtues. 

XXVI. 

We  often  experience  more  regret  over  the 
part  we  have  left,  than  pleasure  over  the  part 
we  have  preferred. 

XXVII. 

All  moralists  have  discerned  a  mysterious 
connection  between  pride,  that  voluptuousness 
of  the  spirit,  and  voluptuousness,  that  pride  of 
the  flesh. 

XXVIII. 

The  same  vanity  causes  us  to  announce  our- 
selves as  new  as  to  mind  and  ideas,  and  ancient 
as  to  descent  and  nobility. 

XXIX. 

Great  dejection  often  follows  great  enthusiasm. 


104  THOUGHTS. 

XXX. 

The  imagination  passes  over  pleasure,  but  not 
over  suffering. 

XXXI. 

Long-continued  happiness  seems  to  require 
an  excuse,  and  long-continued  unhappiness,  par- 
don. 

XXXII. 

One  grain  of  sand,  which  would  not  check  a 
torrent,  holds  in  check  the  sea. 

XXXIII. 

When  unhappy,  one  doubts  everything  ;  when 
happy,  one  doubts  nothing. 

XXXIV. 

Our  folly  does  not  fail  to  seek  happiness  where 
even  our  reason  knows  well  that  it  is  not  to  be 
found. 

XXXV. 

At  one  time  everything  succeeds  with  us, 
though  we  heap  faults  upon  faults ;  at  another 
time  we  might  perform  wonders,  and  nothing 
succeeds  according  to  our  wish. 

XXXVI. 

Whoever  does  not  recognize  himself  in  good 
fortune,  will  recognize  himself  just  to  that  de- 
gree in  misfortune. 


JOY,   SUFFERING,  FORTUNE.  105 


XXXVII. 


The  happiness  which   is'  lacking  makes  one 
think  even  the  happiness  one  has  unbearable. 


XXXVIII. 


I  look  at  what  I  have  not,  and  think  myself 
unhappy ;  others  look  at  what  I  have,  and  think 
me  happy. 

XXXIX. 

If  you  feel  happy  to  the  point  of  saying  so, 
listen  !  unhappiness  is  at  your  door. 


XL. 


Man  is  not  made  for  joy,  and  he  becomes 
habituated  to  joy  to  the  point  of  satiety ;  man 
is  made  for  pain,  and  he  resists  pain  to  the  point 
of  despair :  a  double  mystery  ! 

XLI. 

Success  shows  off  our  good  qualities ;  lack  of 
success  shows  off  our  defects. 

XLII. 

Merit  passes  current,  —  but  as  contraband. 

XLIII. 

We  are  deceived  both  by  our  hopes  and  by 
our  fears. 


I06  THOUGHTS. 


XLIV. 


Delicate  souls  seefn  more  at  their  ease  in  deli- 
cate bodies. 

XLV. 

Evil  often  triumphs,  but  never  conquers. 

XLVI. 

"  I  thought  him  faithful.  .  .  .  He  has  deceived 
me  !  "  To  say,  "  I  deceived  myself,"  would  be 
more  just. 

XLVII. 

At  the  bottom  of  every  man  there  is  an  abyss 
which  hope,  joy,  ambition,  hate,  love,  the  sweet- 
ness of  thinking,  the  pleasure  of  writing,  the 
pride  of  conquest,  cannot  fill.  The  whole  world 
cast  into  that  abyss  would  not  satisfy  it ;  but,  oh 
my  God !  a  drop,  one  single  drop  of  your  grace, 
causes  it  to  overflow.  It  is  you  who  are  the 
principle  of  real  joy.  Without  you  one  laughs, 
but  one  says  at  that  laugh,  "  Why  dost  thou  de- 
ceive me  ? "  That  laugh  is  harsh,  like  a  note 
which  offends  the  laws  of  harmony;  cold,  like 
those  waters  which  never  reflect  the  sun. 

XLVIII. 

The  same  desire  which,  planted  on  earth, 
will  produce  the  flowers  of  a  day,  sown  in 
heaven,  will  bear  the  fruits  of  eternity. 


JOY,   SUFFERING,  FORTUNE.  1 07 

XLIX. 

The  heart  which  has  wept  much  resembles 
the  rock  of  Horeb,  which  is  now  dry,  but  pre- 
serves the  mark  of  the  waters  which  gushed 
from  it  in  days  of  yore. 


Everything  that  is  exquisite  hides  itself. 

LI. 

There  are  in  this  world  beings  who  are  not  of 
this  world.  The  public  (for  a  long  time  the  ex- 
pression ran  —  the  vulgar  herd),  when  it  beholds 
them  pass,  judges  them  to  be  haughty,  eccentric, 
insane. . .  .  Ah  !  if  the  public  could  see  them  feel, 
think,  suffer !  Then  it  would  account  them  as 
more  of  men  than  other  men. 

LII. 

Pleasure  attracts  —  like  a  void. 

LIII. 

That  which  deceives  us  and  does  us  harm, 
also  undeceives  us  and  does  us  good. 

LIV. 

Socrates  asked  that  he  might  be  lodged  and 
fed  at  the  expense  of  the  Republic  in  the  Pryta- 
neum  of  Athens  ;  he  obtained  a  prison  and  hem- 


108  THOUGHTS. 

lock.  —  Merit  is  conscious  of  itself ;  at  need,  it 
puts  forth  its  claims.  .  .  .  Happy  is  it  if  its  de- 
mand is  merely  refused  !  .  .  . 

LV. 

In  youth  one  has  tears  without  grief :  in  age, 
griefs  without  tears. 

LVI. 

Lofty  mountains  are  full  of  springs ;  great 
hearts  are  full  of  tears. 

LVII. 

Who  resists  the  pleasure  of  preaching  to  a 
priest  ? 

LVIII. 

Let  us  correct  the  habit  of  believing  in.  men, 
and  of  placing  our  hopes  on  them ;  let  us  not 
correct  ourselves  of  the  habit  of  loving  them. 

LIX. 

Natural  philosophers  say,  "  This  drop  of  water 
contains  worlds  of  vibrii,  volvoces,  elminthae, 
and  animalculae  of  all  sorts."  And  we  marvel. 
Who  will  tell  (a  nomenclature  no  less  interest- 
ing) the  myriads  of  thoughts  and  feelings  con- 
tained in  one  tear  which  has  fallen  from  the 
heart  ? 

LX. 

Solitude  vivifies  ;  isolation  kills. 


VI. 
TIME,    LIFE,    DEATH,   THE   FUTURE. 


Cicero  asserts  that  the  noises  of  earth  pre- 
vent men  from  hearing  the  harmony  of  the  stars 
as  they  roll  through  the  ether. 

In  the  same  way,  the  tumult  of  the  century 
and  the  bustle  of  life  render  the  soul  deaf  to  the 
mysterious  voices  which  summon  him  on  high. 


The  future,  the  future,  to  what  can  I  compare 
the  future  ? 

A  strange  flame  flies  through  the  shadow. 
And  in  order  to  seize  it,  you  run,  —  you  run  to 
seize  the  wandering  light.  .  .  .  Courage !  you 
will  overtake  it.  .  .  .  You  have  reached  it ! 
Alas !  the  brightness  disperses,  and  a  precipice 
engulfs  you  !     Image  of  the  future. 

The  future,  the  future,  to  what  can  I  compare 
the  future  ? 

You  have  been  told  of  the  mirage  which 
spreads  over  the  horizon  of  the  desert.     The 


HO  THOUGHTS. 

pilgrim,  hoping  for  a  soft  couch  amid  the  ver- 
dant grass,  and  fresh  water  from  the  sparkling 
lake,  hastens  onward.  Transported  with  joy,  he 
stretches  out  his  hands,  he  utters  a  cry.  .  .  . 
Alas  !  the  mirage  has  vanished  !  Image  of  the 
future. 

The  future,  the  future,  to  what  can  I  compare 
the  future  ? 

When  you  were  a  child,  it  sometimes  happened 
to  you  that  you  possessed  handfuls  of  gold- 
pieces  in  your  dreams.  You  said  to  yourself  : 
"  How  shall  I  spend  this  fortune  ?  I  will  buy 
this  and  that.  .  .  ."  Illusion  !  The  day  breaks, 
there  is  no  more  treasure !  Ima'ge  of  the 
future. 

A  man  ransacks  the  great  sea,  seeking  for 
pearls :  "  Surely,  I  shall  have  a  happy  old  age !  " 
He  speaks  and  dives,  and  dives  again,  and  goes 
on  diving !  Horrors !  when  he  rose  he  was  a 
corpse  !     Image  of  the  future. 

Yes,  the  future  lures  us  on,  bears  us  away, 
and  ruins  us.  I  speak  of  that  future  towards 
which  men  direct  their  gaze.  Another  future, 
very  faithful,  very  true,  is  the  future  in  the 
skies.  That  never  deceives.  When  shall  we 
pursue  it,  —  it  alone  ? 

in. 

Man,  finding  himself  miserable,  comforts  him- 
self with  the  thought  that  the  past,  which  he  has 


TIME,   LIFE,  DEATH,    THE  FUTURE,      in 

not  seen,  was  worth  more  than  the  present,  —  that 
present  which  is  obvious  to  him  with  all  its  vices 
unsoftened  by  distance. 

IV. 

"Oh,  cruel  death!"  .  .  .  This,  if  I  mistake 
not,  is  a  pagan  phrase.  Death  is  not  cruel,  but 
just  and  severe  :  just  as  the  sentence,  severe  as 
the  punishment. 

v. 

To  live,  to  outlive,  to  live  again,  should  be  the 
whole  of  man. 

VI. 

Life  is  a  stream  upon  which  drift  flowers  in 
spring,  and  blocks  of  ice  in  winter. 

VII. 

Strange  is  life,  into  which  we  enter  weeping, 
through  which  we  weeping  pass,  and  out  of 
which  we  go  still  weeping. 

VIII. 

"Time  restores  all  things."  Wrong!  Time 
restores  many  things,  but  eternity  alone  restores 
all. 

IX. 

The  time  comes  when  one  feels  the  need  of 
the  slumber  of  death,  as,  at  the  end  of  a  toil- 
some day,  one  feels  the  need  of  another  sleep. 


112  THOUGHTS. 

X. 

All  that  passes  gives  rise  to  reflection. 

XI. 

A  little  more  and  I  should  have  crushed  this 
worm  which  must  devour  me  to-morrow. 

XII. 

Man  is  a  braggart !  "lam  killing  time,"  he 
says,  and  it  is  time  which  is  killing  him. 

XIII. 

Ah  !  how  quickly  time  passes  !  and  time  is  our 
life,  it  is  ourselves  here  below.  Life  seems 
interminable  when  one  surveys  it  from  the  end 
at  which  it  begins ;  but  the  other  end  makes 
haste  and  approaches  apace.  In  vain  do  we 
leap  to  right  and  left,  to  retard  its  entrance; 
naught  avails. 

XIV. 

That  which  we  have  the  most  desired  is  that 
which  will  chastise  us  best. 

xv. 

Born  in  the  crowd,  Calixtus  now  rules.  His 
equals  of  yesterday  obey  him  to-day.  Will  he, 
the  man  of  genius,  who  has  happily  succeeded, 
remember  amid  his  lofty  fortune,  the   humble 


TIME,   LIFE,  DEATH,    THE  FUTURE.      113 

and  obscure,  encumbered  with  their  unrecog- 
nized talent  ?  Will  he  rise  to  go  and  take  them 
from  the  rabble  rout  where  they  are  in  danger 
of  suffocation  ?  Will  he  incline  graciously 
towards  them  ?  Will  he  direct  a  glance  towards 
them  ?  Will  he  send  them  a  word  ?  Will  he 
reach  out  his  hand  to  them  to  separate  them 
from  the  vulgar  herd,  to  raise  them  above  the 
multitude,  to  make  them  manifest  to  themselves, 
to  himself,  to  all  ?  Calixtus  cannot ;  Calixtus 
will  not.     The  great  Calixtus  loves  only  fools. 

XVI. 

He  compares  himself  to  the  guest,  who,  weary 
of  eating  in  emptiness  and  digesting  in  imagi- 
nation, takes  it  ill  that  he  should  be  summoned 
at  last  to  seat  himself  at  table  at  the  hour  of 
betaking  himself  to  sleep. 

It  is  because  he  is,  above  all,  delicate, —  I  mean 
delicate  in  character.  A  morsel  of  dry  bread 
pleases  him  better  than  a  dainty  dish  obtained 
by  a  mean  action.  That  which  predominates  in 
him  is  the  head  and  the  heart.  The  disinter- 
estedness of  which  he  has  furnished  more  than 
one  example,  has  won  him  the  peculiar  renown 
of  not  being  a  practical  man,  of  living  in  the 
clouds,  like  a  poet  as  he  is.  It  is  not  denied 
that  he  knows  how  to  think,  to  write,  to  speak ; 
all  admit  that  he  is  a  master  on  these  points. 


1 14  THOUGHTS. 

As  for  other  things,  he  passes  for  being  unsuited 
to  them ;  this  makes  him  so  difficult  to  place, 
that  he  is  no  longer  thought  of,  if  he  was  for- 
merly thought  of  at  times.  An  employment  for 
him  !  a  title  !  a  dignity  !  .  .  .  In  the  first  place, 
he  has  not  asked,  and  in  the  next  place,  what  if 
he  were  to  refuse  !  .  .  . 

XVII. 

A- blade  of  grass  which  has  sprung  up  amid 
the  sand,  bends  towards  the  brook ;  and  each 
wave,  as  it  passes,  shakes  the  blade  of  grass, 
which  falls,  and  rises  to  fall  once  more.  .  .  . 

This  blade  of  grass  is  man,  who  is  tossed 
about  by  the  billows  of  life,  and  who  is,  in  turn, 
bowed  down  by  trials,  and  raised  again  by  hope. 

The  blade  of  grass  yields  little  by  little  to  the 
wave,  falling  each  time  lower,  rising  each  time 
less  high.  The  wave  draws  it,  tears  it  up  at 
last,  and  bears  it  away. 

Thus  man,  that  blade  of  grass,  toils  wearily 
until  he  succumbs.  That  rapid  water,  which  is 
called  time,  tosses  him  about,  uproots  him,  and 
hurries  him  on  towards  the  ocean  of  eternity. 

XVIII. 

Lack  of  credit  is  worse  than  lack  of  money. 
"The  loss  of  money  is  not  deadly,"  says  the 


TIME,  LIFE,  DEATH,    THE  FUTURE.      115 

proverb.      Money  can  be  replaced.     But  what 
can  replace  credit  and  honor  ? 

XIX. 

A  man  who  is  not  in  his  place  is  like  a  dis- 
located bone  ;  he  suffers  «*nd  he  causes  suffering. 

xx. 

Man  made  anew  by  Christ,  in  his  image  and 
in  his  likeness  ;  man  raised  anew,  and  yet  anew 
by  grace ;  man  educated  and  completed  by  faith, 
ecce  homo  !  this  is  man,  man  such  as  he  should 
be,  the  true  man,  the  man  of  Christ,  the  Chris- 
tian. 

XXI. 

Some. certain  period  of  your  life,  which  was 
so  cruel  to  traverse,  will,  perhaps,  one  day 
merit  your  regrets  ;  and,  perhaps,  at  the  present 
moment  you  may,  without  knowing  it,  be  finish- 
ing your  share  of  terrestrial  happiness. 

XXII. 

Happiness  comes  only  from  one  quarter, 
unhappiness  comes  from  all  quarters. 

XXIII. 

Life  is  passed  in  desiring  what  one  has  not, 
in  regretting  what  one  has  no  longer. 


Il6  THOUGHTS. 


xxrv. 


Death,  indifferent  apparently,  by  dint  of  being 
impartial,  spares  no  one  ;  and  those  who  depart 
warn  us  that  we  must  depart  also.  That  which 
saddens  the  heart  instructs  the  spirit. 

xxv. 

Ah !  how  happy  must  they  feel  who  die,  even 
amid  their  regret  for  the  earth,  at  meeting  once 
more,  there  on  high,  those  of  their  family  who 
have  preceded  them  !  Here  we  part ;  in  heaven 
we  shall  find  each  other  again. 


VII. 

THE    FAMILY,   CHILDHOOD,   OLD 
AGE. 


We  know  only  how  to  repeat,  "There  are 
no  longer  any  children."  But  parents  —  are 
there  still  any  of  them  ? 

XL 

A  child  should  be  early  furnished  with  the 
greatest  possible  sum  of  ideas,  of  healthy,  broad, 
and  grand  ideas.  Man  only  likes  to  learn  what 
he  knows.  Now,  if  he  is  not  forewarned  in 
time  of  what  is  just,  beautiful,  and  good,  he 
runs  the  risk  of  spurning  the  just,  later  on, 
as  false,  the  beautiful  as  ugly,  the  good  as  bad  ; 
and  it  will  be  so  much  the  worse  for  him  ;  and, 
above  all,  so  much  the  worse  for  society. 

in. 

I.  His  son  leaves  him,  his  only  son,  the  son  of 
his  old  age,  his   well-beloved   son.      And  the 


Il8  THOUGHTS. 

young  man  smiles  through  his  tears,  he  smiles 
in  order  to  deceive  his  mother,  whose  heart 
trembles,  —  he,  whose  heart  is  trembling  too. 
Poor  son ! 

II.  Time  passed  more  swiftly  in  former 
days!  A  letter?  Oh,  joy!  What  does  he 
say  ?  What  is  he  doing  ?  .  .  .  He  loves  you, 
he  says  that  he  loves  you  ?  .  .  .  A  letter  is  very 
sweet,  but  an  absent  son  is  something  cruel !  .  .  . 
Mother  of  Jesus,  who  lost  your  child  twice  for 
three  days,  give  me  back  my  son !  .  .  .  Poor 
Mother ! 

III.  After  seven  years  (a  century),  this  son 
returns.  It  is  he !  She  kisses  him  a  hundred 
times  in  one,  and  she  lifts  him  up,  as  she  presses 
him  to  her  bosom  !  .  .  .  Relations,  neighbors, 
friends,  troop  in  :  "  You  beheld  my  pain,  now 
share  my  pleasure  !  "  The  table  is  laid.  They 
eat,  they  drink,  they  sing,  —  "  To  thy  health, 
mother!  "...  The  unfortunate  woman  tries  to 
answer,  stammers,  bends  over  her  child,  and 
expires  !     Poor  mother !  poor  son  !  .  .  . 

IV.  Too  much  joy  after  too  much  pain  brings 
death. 

IV. 

"  That  old  man  !  .  .  .  That  young  man  !  .  .  .  " 
So  age  is  an  evil,  an  evil  which  depends  upon 
man,  since  he  is  reproached  with  it  on  every 
occasion ! 


THE  FAMILY,  CHILDHOOD,  OLD  AGE.      119 


Women  must  endure  as  much  as  possible; 
man  must  make  himself  endured  as  little  as 
possible. 

VI. 

The  Mother  :  Grieve  not,  my  son,  because 
thou  art  a  child.  Age  hastens  on,  too,  and  time 
bears  us  away  fast  enough,  without  being  urged 
by  the  spur.  Keep  thy  ignorant  joy.  Days 
will  come  full  of  bitterness  and  anguish.  Then 
the  burden  of  life  will  multiply  on  thy  head, 
thou  wilt  walk  with  bended  back  and  bruised 
heart.  Thou  art  in  thy  springtime :  then  blos- 
som, sing,  and  smile  while  awaiting  the  sharp 
and  gloomy  winter. 

The  Father  :  Life  is  a  stern  and  manly  thing, 
my  son.  Have  a  care  that  thou  become  a  man 
speedily.  Thy  soul  is  small,  increase  it ;  thy 
heart  is  frail,  strengthen  it.  Command  thy  feet 
to  be  energetic,  thy  hands  to  be  robust,  thy 
breast  to  be  proud  and  persevering.  Every 
road  groans.  Happy  is  he  who  never  succumbs, 
or  who,  having  succumbed,  rises  again !  Pre- 
pare to  pay  the  tribute  of  sweat  and  tears,  owed 
by  every  traveller  upon  earth. 

The  Child  :  Joy,  sadness,  confident  tranquil- 
ity, uneasy  foresight,  .  .  .  which  shall  I  choose  ? 
Must  I  abandon  myself  to  present  delights,  or 


120  THOUGHTS. 

anticipate  future  trials  ?  What  is  life  ?  All 
pleasure  ?  all  pain  ?  .  .  .  I  shall  only  know  the 
taste  of  that  vase  of  mystery  after  I  shall  have 
drunk  it  to  the  dregs. 

VII. 

Education,  properly  understood,  is  that  which 
teaches  discernment,  in  order  that  one  may 
love  or  hate  that  which  is  really  loveworthy  or 
hateful. 

VIII. 

A  child  is  told,  — "  Love  this  person :  hate 
that  one : "  and  the  child,  who  has  confidence 
in  the  command,  cherishes  the  one  and  detests 
the  other. 

Many  great  persons  are  children  in  this  re- 
spect, loving  or  hating  on  the  word  of  others. 


IX. 

Does  instruction  render  good  natures  bet- 
ter, as  frequently  as  it  renders  bad  natures 
worse  ?  .  .  . 

x. 

Childhood  is  subject  to  slumber  so  profound 
that  the  sense  of  time  and  place  is  lost  :  — 
What  day  is  to-day  ?  .  .  .  Where  am  I  ?  .  .  .  are 
the  cries  on  waking. 


THE  FAMILY,   CHILDHOOD,  OLD  AGE.      12 1 


XI. 

The  memory  of  certain  dreams  survives  child- 
hood. ..."  Have  I  seen  that  or  dreamed  it  ? . . ." 
one  asks  one's  self,  at  long  intervals  in  the 
course  of  one's  life. 


VIII. 
THE   COUNTRY,   THE   PEASANT. 


The  people  of  Tulle  call  our  peasants  peccata. 
This  nickname  contains  an  admirable  meaning. 
The  peasant  is,  indeed,  sin,  original  sin,  still 
persistent  and  visible,  in  all  its  brutal  simplicity, 
in  all  its  simple  brutishness. 

ii. 

The  peasant  loves  nothing  and  nobody  except 
for  the  use  he  can  make  of  him. 

in. 

If  you  do  good  to  a  peasant,  he  will  not  love 
you,  perhaps :  do  evil  to  him  and  he  will  cer- 
tainly fear  you. 

IV. 

All  that  any  peasant  requires,  to  become  a 
great  saint,  is  to  be  supernaturally  that  which 
he  is  naturally,  —  laborious,  sober,  patient,  re- 
signed. .  .  . 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 23 


The  peasant  who  does  not  come  to  us  from 
necessity,  believes  himself  to  be  necessary,  and 
assumes  importance  as  soon  as  we  go  to  him 
out  of  charity. 

VI. 

The  peasant  is  a  deist ;  beyond  that  he  heeds 
nothing  that  is  said  or  done. 

VII. 

"  Does  one  ever  know  of  whom  or  of  what  one 
may  have  need  ? "  That,  in  brief,  is  the  peas- 
ant's preoccupation,  his  criterion,  his  spring  of 
action. 

VIII. 

The  peasant  is  a  sullen  payer,  like  the  soil 
which  he  tills. 

IX. 

Creation  has  no  animal  more  sober  than  the 
peasant  in  his  own  house,  less  sober  than  the 
peasant  in  other  people's  houses. 

x. 

The  peasant  does  not  so  much  deprive  him- 
self of  enjoyment  as  he  enjoys  the  act  of  de- 
priving himself. 

XI. 

Was  there  ever  a  peasant-patriarch  ? 


124  THOUGHTS. 


XII. 

The  peasant  admits  that  the  most  petty  em- 
ployee in  the  town  is  greater  than  he. 

XIII. 

The  earth,  mellowed  by  a  recent  rain,  shines 
in  the  sun,  as  fat  and  brown  as  a  honey  cake. 

The  man,  goad  in  hand,  weighs  down  the 
heavy  plough  which  two  cows  draw  with  diffi- 
culty. 

The  team,  it  seems,  never  goes  as  it  should. 

And  the  man  harshly  reproves,  reproaches, 
appeals  to  the  poor  beasts. 

"Ha!  Rousselle!  Ha!  Fromente !  ha,  there ! " 

But  Fromente  and  Rousselle,  no  longer 
knowing  what  they  are  about,  trace  the  furrow 
awry :  and  the  man,  more  provoked  than  ever, 
speaks  sharply  to  them,  strikes  them,  and  blas- 
phemes ! 

The  cows  utter  a  long  low  of  distress ;  it  is 
useless,  they  will  not  stir.  He  must  unharness 
them.  .  .  . 

No  sooner  are  they  unbound  than  they  set 
out  for  home  at  a  gallop,  gloomy,  wild,  agitated 
as  at  the  approach  of  a  storm.  .  .  . 

A  fellow -laborer  with  God,  he  has  blas- 
phemed. 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  12 5 

XIV. 

They  were  married  young  ;  he  seemed  a  child, 
she  a  little  sister.  Acquaintance  produces  dis- 
gust, —  often,  not  always.  Witness  this  couple, 
who  were  more  loving  every  morning  than  the 
day  before. 

The  most  fragile  thing  is  not  love  ;  it  is  life 

She  died. . .  .  He  could  not  die,  but  he  ceased 
to  live. 

Oh,  lost  happiness  !     Oh,  faithful  love  ! 

As  his  face  grew  ever  paler,  some  said :  "  It 
is  the  effect  of  the  black :  his  color  will  come 
back  when  he  leaves  off  mourning.  ..." 

He  no  longer  cared  for  anything.  Work,  ap- 
petite, sleep,  farewell !  Oh,  how  lonely  he  found 
himself  night  and  day  ! 

Driven  by  excess  of  anguish,  he  rose  at  all 
hours,  and  he  wandered  about  the  house,  making 
the  ancient  joists  to  creak  beneath  his  fevered 
tread,  drinking  in  the  tears  which  coursed  down 
his  cheeks.  .  .  . 

Sometimes,  craving  air,  he  opened  a  window, 
and,  with  his  elbows  resting  upon  the  sill,  he 
gazed  at  the  heavens,  —  the  heavens  all  sown 
with  stars. 

One  woman  had  pleased  him  among  a  thou- 
sand women,  and  among  so  many  stars  one  star 
pleased  him.     That  star  was  something  to  him. 


126  THOUGHTS. 

Did  she  recognize  him?  Yes,  without  doubt. 
Otherwise,  why  that  long  look  opened  obsti- 
nately upon  him,  that  long,  deep,  pure,  calm,  at 
times  humid,  look  ? . . .  Ah,  it  is  the  look  of  his 
love! 

And  his  eyes,  his  arms,  his  lips,  begin  to  reach 
up  on  high ;  and  his  heart  begins  to  beat  as 
though  it  would  burst  from  his  breast.  .  .  . 

Then,  exhausted  with  fever  and  ecstasy,  he 
let  himself  fall  upon  his  knees ;  and  the  dawn, 
taking  pity  on  him,  brought  him  a  little  repose. 

One  day  I  met  him  going  (in  body,  not  in 
spirit)  to  his  vineyard. 

On  perceiving  me,  he  smiled  ;  and  I  can  still 
behold  his  strange  smile. 

"  Well  ?  ..."  I  asked,  wishing  to  speak  to 
him,  yet  not  knowing  of  what  to  speak. 

He  replied  at  once  :  "  Well ...  I  have  seen  her. 
They  said  she  was  dead ;  they  think  she  is  be- 
neath the  earth,  down  there  ! . . .  It  is  folly !  She 
is  there  above,  alive  !  .  .  .  I  invite  her  to  come 
down.  .  .  .  She  would  like  to.  Can  she  ?  .  .  . 
Ah,  the  poor  woman !  .  .  .  In  truth,  it  cannot 
go  on  so  ;  we  must  return  together,  she  with 
me,  or  I  with  her,  for  ever !  " 

xv. 

A  sojourn  in  the  country  pleases  city  folk 
greatly,  —  a  brief  and  rare  sojourn,  in  the  fine 


THE    COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  \2J 

season,  when  all  is  verdure,  flowers,  fruit,  songs 
of  birds,  lays  of  hay-makers,  reapers,  and  vine- 
dressers ;  when  the  days  are  long,  pure,  and 
generous,  the  nights  slightly  warm  and  serene, 
the  roads  perfumed  ;  when  life  is  superabundant 
within  us  and  around  us ;  when  Nature,  hospi- 
table queen,  receives. 

And  the  city  people  exclaim  :  "  God  !  God  ! 
how  admirable  is  the  country !  How  I  should 
like  to  live  in  the  country  !  How  happy  you  are 
to  live  in  the  country ! "  .  .  . 

That  the  country  is  admirable  is  certain  ;  that 
you  would  like  to  reside  there  is  possible ;  but 
that  it  is  good  to  live  there  is  open  to  debate. . 

The  country  is  not  always  flowery,  nor  melo- 
dious, nor  ready  with  a  welcome.  After  summer, 
autumn,  winter ;  that  is  to  say,  cold,  retreat, 
silence,  mourning.  The  trees  are  bald  and 
poor ;  the  bushes  depeopled,  surly,  sinister ;  the 
roads  filled  with  ignoble  mire ;  the  meadows 
faded  ;  the  fields  bare  ;  the  sky  lugubrious  ;  the 
air  inclement  and  harsh. 

Henceforth,  the  only  refuge  is  the  hearth  :  the 
hearth  sparkling  with  life,  gaiety,  and  flame  in 
the  cities  ;  mean,  monotonous,  sluggish,  cold,  in 
the  country!  .  .  . 

XVI. 

A  sample  of  the  country  does  the  city  good ; 
a  sample  of  the  city  does  the  country  good. 


128  THOUGHTS. 


XVII. 


Have  you  ever  walked  some  road,  green  to 
right  and  to  left,  quite  white  in  the  middle,  on 
one  of  those  evenings  of  autumn,  mysterious 
and  solemn,  which  cause  a  man  to  hold  his  peace 
as  in  a  church  ? 

Then  you  have  heard  a  voice  issuing  from  the 
depths  of  the  shadow,  grave,  sonorous,  penetrat- 
ing, sad  as  a  sob,  plaintive  as  a  sigh. 

A  poet  calls  the  frog  a  "  little  monster  with 
soft  eyes."  That  saying  has  caused  laughter. 
Why  has  he  not,  rather,  praised  his  voice  !  We 
might  have  smiled,  perhaps.  .  .  . 

That  liquid  voice  falls  drop  by  drop  \nto  the 
obscure  silence  of  things,  like  water  from  the 
rock  into  the  granite  basin ;  that  voice  vibrates 
and  leaps  through  space  like  the  bow  of  cork 
beneath  the  crystal  keys  of  a  harmonica. 

A  daughter  of  Saint  Theresa  said  to  me, 
"  Admire  the  manner  in  which  God  has  shared 
his  gifts  among  his  creatures  !  The  peacock 
dazzles  with  his  plumage,  but  his  hoarse  cry 
brings  disenchantment.  The  nightingale  is  a 
paltry  bird ;  it  is  clad  like  a  beggar ;  when  it 
sings,  there  is  no  music  so  delicious.  And  the 
frog,  how  ugly  he  is!  Ah,  good  Jesus,  how 
ugly  the  creature  is !  Nevertheless  (and  I  say  it 
to  you  only),  he  alone,  amid  solitude,  moves  me 


THE    COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 29 

according  to  my  desire,  and  helps  me  to  medi- 
tate." .  .  . 

XVIII. 

Mme.  de  Se'vigne'  and  La  Bruyere  have  a 
gloomy  page  upon  the  peasant,  which  our  econo- 
mists and  politicians,  singularly  moved,  and  with 
reason,  quote  triumphantly :  "  Ah  !  how  much 
better  is  the  condition  of  the  inhabitant  of  the 
country,  thanks  to  the  revolution ! "  .  .  . 

In  truth,  the  lot  of  the  peasant  is  always  the 
same.  Take  a  great  lady,  accustomed  to  the 
splendors  of  the  faubourg,  or  some  prince  of 
finance,  fascinated  with  the  luxury  and  the 
comfort  of  Paris  ;  show  them  suddenly,  on  the 
spot,  the  sordid  dwelling  of  one  of  our  good 
peasants,  his  frightful  bed,  his  dirty  table,  his 
course  bread,  his  hard  and  heavy  linen  and  his 
vile  clothes,  his  loathsome  food  and  his  nauseous 
drink,  his  life  narrow,  harsh,  desolate,  imposed 
upon  by  every  one,  deceived  by  all,  rendered 
harder  by  all,  — show  them  this,  all  this  and  the 
rest,  and  if  they  do  not  utter  a  cry  of  horror,  of 
pity,  perhaps,  for  the  great  moralist  and  the 
good  letter-writer,  it  will  be  because  they  have 
neither  heart  nor  mind. 

XIX. 

Every  countryman  who  learns  to  read  and 
write,  renounces  the  country  in  his  heart. 


130  THOUGHTS. 


XX. 


The  peasant  who  establishes  himself  in  the 
city  falls  by  his  own  weight  into  the  lowest 
depths. 

XXI. 

A  rare  bird  is  the  ex-peasant  who  is  delicate 
and  not  arrogant. 

XXII. 

The  countryman  is  too  much  of  a  child  not  to 
be  a  liar. 

XXIII. 

I  have  known  peasants  who  thought  too  well  of 
the  sun.  That  centre  of  light  and  heat  appears 
to  them,  by  its  habits,  by  its  movements  and  its 
beneficent  action,  a  superior  creature,  and  even 
a  creator,  the  Creator !  There  is  always  some- 
thing of  the  "pagan  "  in  the  "peasant." 

XXIV. 

The  peasant  is  ignorant  of  the  art  of  express- 
ing his  thought  directly  and  clearly  :  the  truth 
of  a  matter  is  not  what  you  will  hear  about  it, 
but  what  you  will  divine  with  regard  to  it. 

XXV. 

In  Theocritus,  and  Virgil,  and  Florian,  and 
Berquin,  you  do  not  imagine  that  the  peasant, 
when  he  sings,  sings  anything  but  "beautiful 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  131 

nature,"  virtuous  love,  God,  his  hearth-stone, 
the  spring,  flowers  and  fruits.  .  .  .  Illusion  ! 
The  peasant  devotes  his  mind  to  howling  non- 
sense, his  heart  to  mewing  coarse  jests ! 

XXVI. 

The  sun  has  just  set  in  gold  and  purple,  the 
moon  shines  in  the  horizon ;  stars  twinkle 
around  her ;  the  cricket  cries,  the  frog  sighs,  the 
butterfly  rustles,  the  nightingale,  full  of  love  and 
harmony,  bursts  forth ;  all  is  joy  and  light  and 
song  and  mirth  and  prayer  and  transport.  .  .  . 

Where  is  man  ?  There  below  he  is  sleeping 
heavily,  incapable  of  all  else  after  having  drunk 
the  wretched  wine  which  he  has  thrown  up  in 
the  form  of  vile  songs ! 

XXVII. 

When  a  poor  peasant  dies,  it  is  not  he  whom 
one  pities  (plaindre  also  signifies  to  regret  in  our 
Limousin  language),  but  his  wife,  his  children, 
the  property  which  he  leaves  in  disorder.  The 
disceased's  whole  household  might  almost  be 
buried  with  him,  so  natural  are  suttees. 

XXVIII. 

The  man  of  the  fields  is  incomplete  without 
his  beast  of  burden  ;  take  away  his  ox,  his  cow, 
his   ass,  and  you   spoil   him.     The   Decalogue 


132  THOUGHTS. 

raises  a  smile.  .  .  .  Moses  knew  his  man.  The 
legislation  of  the  Middle  Ages  also  protected  the 
beast  of  burden. 

Thus  is  explained  the  fast  imposed  upon  ani- 
mals, their  accessory  extermination  or  their  sal- 
vation :  Homines  etjumenta  salvabis,  Domine. 

The  farewell  of  the  Arab  horseman  has  long 
been  the  subject  of  song  and  story.  And  the 
regrets  of  the  laborer  for  his  oxen,  of  the  house- 
wife for  her  cows  ?  It  seems  to  me  that  a  Millien 
or  a  Langlade  would  have  found  here  a  fruitful 
theme. 

Those  who  reproach  Pierre  Dupont  for  his 
famous  refrain,  — 

"  J'aime  Jeanne  ma  femme ;  eh  bien!  j'aimerais  mieux 
La  voir  mourir,  que  voir  mourir  mes  boeufs!  .  .  ." 

"  I  love  Jeanne  my  wife  ;  well,  I  should  much  prefer 
Rather  than  see  my  oxen  die,  to  see  the  last  of  her !" 

do  not  consider  that  a  wife  costs  nothing,  and 
that  oxen  cost  a  great  deal ;  that  a  peasant  can 
live  and  work  without  his  wife,  but  not  without 
his  oxen.  .  .  . 

Thus  Napoleon  the  Great  counted  the  loss  of 
a  horse  dearer  than  that  of  a  soldier. 

xxix. 
The  dandelion. 

Consider  it ;  an  upright  stalk,  a  round  head, 
set  with  winged  seeds,  all  white  and  quivering.  .  . 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 33 

One  would  say  a  ball  of  needles ;  one  would  say 
the  helmet  of  a  paladin  bristling  with  darts. 

The  breeze,  at  dawn  of  day,  blows  gently, 
gently  gathers  them,  gently  embarks  them  ;  and 
the  pretty  flotilla  sails  before  the  wind  at  God's 
pleasure,  mounting,  descending,  advancing  ever, 
furnished  with  its  own  ballast  and  its  own  sails ; 
the  ballast  is  the  seed,  which  weighs  it  down 
below ;  the  sail  is  the  tuft  which  bears  you  on, 
mysterious  skiffs ! 

And  the  innocent  armada  alights  where  God 
calls  it.  It  is  often  in  an  arid  spot.  The  blessed 
immigration  establishes  itself  in  this  desert, 
decks  it  with  flowers,  comforts  it,  peoples  it, 
while  other  seeds  departing  thence,  go  to  colo- 
nize other  places  in  their  turn. 

May  the  gratitude  of  man  sakite,  in  those  dis- 
tant regions,  the  wandering  plant,  with  name  as 
graceful  as  itself ! 

xxx. 

She  is  a  large  and  robust  spinster,  slow  of 
mind  and  of  word,  faded  by  age  and  poverty. 

She  tranquilly  pursues  her  little  path.  To 
help  with  the  harvest  and  the  vintage  ;  to  break 
hemp,  to  spin  wool,  for  other  people,  of  course  ; 
to  tend  a  neighbor's  child ;  to  rear,  as  she  can, 
a  wretched  little  pig,  which  she  will  sell  at  the 
end  of  a  year  for  a  miserable  sum,  this  or  nearly 
this  is  her  whole  occupation. 


134  THOUGHTS. 

Naturally,  hunger  sometimes  pays  her  a  visit ; 
no  one  suspects  it  except  the  good  God  to  whom 
she  prays  in  church,  alone,  at  the  hour  when 
people  are  supping  in  their  houses.  Sometimes 
the  poor  woman  sinks  with  exhaustion.  Then 
alms  flow  in  abundantly:  — 

"  But,  B6n£dicte,  when  you  are  in  want,  why 
do  you  not  beg  ? "  —  "  Beg  ?  Death  rather  than 
that ! " 

"  Then,  why  have  you  not  married  ? " 

M  He" !     No  one  wanted  me." 

XXXI. 

O  peasant,  thou  tillest  the  fields  and  fertil- 
izest  them,  and  sowest  them  ; 

Thou  makest  the  wheat  to  rise  from  the  earth  ; 

Through  thee,  the  "  barren  "  is  converted  into 
grain ; 

Thou  nourishest  man,  who  is  flesh. 

It  is  thanks  to  thy  efforts  that  we  live  here 
below. 

Thou  buriest  a  dead,  cold  seed,  which  soon 
revives,  and  flowers,  and  fructifies.  .  .  . 

Glory  to  thee,  O  peasant ! 

O  priest,  thou  tillest  souls,  thou  enrichest 
them  with  the  word,  and  the  example  and  the 
seeds  of  faith,  hope,  and  love. 

Thou  makest  God  to  descend  from  heaven ; 

Through  thee,  the  wheat  is  changed  into  God ; 


THE    COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 35 

Thou  nourishest  man  who  is  a  soul ; 

It  is  thanks  to  thy  efforts  that  we  live  on  high. 

Thou  dost  bury  a  body  forsaken  by  life,  and 
destined  to  decay ;  but  this  body,  reconciled  to 
its  soul,  will  rise  one  day,  and  that  day  will  be 
as  long  as  eternity !  .  .  . 

O  priest,  glory  to  thee  ! 

XXXII. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  second  Empire,  the 
peasants  showed  themselves  rabid  Imperialists  ; 
they  voted  as  one  man  in  favor  of  the  "  Gentle 
Caesar."  And  the  politicians  of  Paris  began  to 
cry:  "Brutes  of  peasants!"  etc.  They  de- 
spaired of  winning  the  peasant.  They  misun- 
derstood him. 

The  prefects  once  changed,  the  mayors  re- 
placed, the  deputies  renewed,  the  peasant,  who 
was  believed  to  be  attached  to  the  very  soil  trod- 
den by  the  Rouhers  and  the  Mornys,  passed  over 
completely,  arms  and  baggage,  to  the  Republic. 

And  behold  him  a  Republican  until  further 
orders. 

The  peasant  never  sets  out  quickly,  but  he 
always  arrives  surely. 

XXXIII. 

When  will  it  come  to  pass  that  the  peasant 
alone  will  be  ashamed  to  speak  the  language  of 
his  fathers  ? 


136  THOUGHTS. 

XXXIV. 

The  Witch. 

A  philosopher  has  defined  man  as  "a  reli- 
gious animal."  Why  am  not  I  a  philosopher? 
I  would  define  the  peasant  as  "  a  superstitious 
animal." 

O  Paul  Bert,  thou  canst  tear  the  heart  from 
the  hedgehogs  of  Brive ;  thou  wilt  never  take 
faith  from  our  peasants.  This  faith  is  not  always 
in  conformity  with  the  Gospel :  no  matter  !  it  is 
still  faith,  less  abominable  to  men  and  angels 
than  incredulity.  The  countryman,  in  spite  of 
instructors,  in  spite  even  of  the  cures,  believes 
in  sorcerers  and  witches,  like  the  Romans,  like 
the  Gauls.  Canidia  is  not  dead,  nor  Velleda 
either.     Ask  M6rigale ! 

"  Knock  !   knock  ! 

"  —  Who  goes  there  ? 

"  —  It  is  we,  Me>igale. 

"  —  What  do  you  wish  ? 

"  —  The  daughter  of  Jantou  of  Marsalieu,  has 
been  burned  all  over  with  petroleum  which  was 
poured  upon  her  by  mistake.  Come,  heal 
her.  .  .  ." 

It  is  far  to  Marsalieu  :  the  clock  strikes  mid- 
night ;  the  sky  is  as  black  as  pitch.  .  .  . 

Merigale  hesitates.  .  .  .  Then:  "Wait  for  me; 
I  will  come  down." 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 37 

And  she  hastily  fastens  her  petticoat,  her 
dress ;  throws  a  handkerchief  about  her  neck, 
puts  on  her  "  straw,"  her  galoshes.  .  .  . 

"  The  case  is  urgent,  then  ? " 

"It  is." 

"  Let  us  go  ! " 

Two  women  hasten  to  the  right  and  left  of 
the  witch  ;  five  or  six  men  precede  them,  some 
carrying  lanterns,  others  wisps  of  lighted  straw, 
others  still  cudgels.  . \  . 

Forests,  meadows,  thickets ;  hedges,  brooks, 
and  ditches  are  traversed  at  racing  speed.  .  .  . 
O  Rembrandt ! 

And  the  procession  gallops,  gallops,  gallops 
on. . . .  Woods,  bushes,  moors,  question  each  other 
in  the  darkness  :  "Where  is  Merigale  going  at 
this  hour  ?  .  .  .  The  owl  forgets  to  hoot,  and  'tis 
all  the  better  so ;  the  nightingale  breaks  off  her 
nocturne  of  love,  and  'tis  all  the  worse;  the 
frog,  on  hearing  the  earth  resound,  inquires  in 
his  crystal  voice  :  "  Is  it  a  witches'  sabbath  ? " 

And  the  train  gallops,  gallops,  still.  .  .  . 

Plains,  valleys,  hills,  hold  soft  converse : 
"But  it  is  not  Christmas,  that  Merigale  should 
go  to  midnight  mass  ?  What  is  going  on  in  the 
country  ?  There  is  surely  something  new.  .  .  ." 
The  watch  dog  barks  at  her,  mistaking  her  for 
the  moon ;  in  the  depths  of  the  stable  lows  the 
ox;  the  herdsman  roused  from  slumber,  mur- 


138  THOUGHTS. 

murs,  with  eye  pressed  to  the  pane  of  his  cabin  : 
"  The  Spectre  Chase.  .  .  ." 

And  the  train  gallops  on.  .  .  . 

"  It  is  here  !  .  .  ." 

Merigale  enters,  haughty  and  mysterious. 

"  The  sick  girl  ? " 

They  point  to  the  poor  young  girl,  gasping, 
screaming,  swathed  in  bandages. 

Merigale,  full  of  her  r61e,  observes  in  silence 
that  open  mouth,  which  utters  cries  of  pain, 
those  limbs  which  contract,  those  arms  which 
are  contorted.  .  .  . 

Those  around  her  wait.  A  horrible  waiting, 
composed  of  contemplation  and  anguish  ! 

Suddenly:— "Ashes!   fire!   flame!" 

No  one  understands,  no  one  stirs. 

"  —  A  chafing-dish  and  embers  !  " 

They  hasten,  they  elbow  each  other,  they 
contend  for  the  kitchen  utensils.  .  .  . 

A  large  earthen  dish  is  placed  on  the  table, 
over  against  the  bed,  before  Merigale. 

"  Favete  Unguis  !  "  a  priestess  of  Vesta  would 
have  said.  Our  witch  contents  herself  with 
exclaiming  :  —  "  No  noise  !  " 

The  spectators  hold  their  peace;  the  unfor- 
tunate girl  herself  looks  and  listens. 

Then  Merigale  raises  her  eyes  to  heaven, 
blows  upon  the  embers,  and  makes  the  sign  of 
the  cross  over  them,  over  the  dish,  over  the 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  139 

child  (the  number  three  is  sacred)  :  then  sighs, 
then  coughs,  then  sneezes ;  then  mutters  a 
Pater,  then  whispers  an  Ave,  then  quavers  a 
Credo  ;  then  strikes  three  blows  upon  her  right 
hand,  then  three  blows  upon  her  left ;  then 
grumbles  and  hisses  out  a  mass  of  interjections 
as  frightful  as  they  are  uncouth,  and  which 
make  you  think  of  the  witch  scene  in  Macbeth. 
Finally  she  chants  the  cabalistic  syllables  of 
Little  Albert,  jerking  them  out  slowly.  .  .  . 

Here  the  witch  resumes  her  ordinary  expres- 
sion of  countenance,  and  her  natural  voice. 

"  Is  it  done  ?  " 

u  Yes,  it  is  done." 

A  long  sigh  of  relief  runs  through  the 
room.  .  .  . 

The  little  one's  father  comes  forward. 

"Thanks.  .  .  .  How  much  do  we  owe  you ? " 

"  Nothing." 

"  The  good  God  will  requite  you ! "  says  the 
mother. 

Barely  a  fortnight  has  passed ;  she  presents 
herself  before  Merigale,  and  from  the  depths  of 
a  huge  basket  she  draws  out  a  pair  of  ducks,  an 
enormous  pat  of  butter,  a  bottle  of  garus  elixir, 
and  two  pounds  of  wool. 

"All  that  for  me?" 

"  My  husband  has  beaten  over  the  whole  of 
Marsalieu  to  catch  a  hare  for  you  ;  impossible  to 
find  one,  to  his  great  regret." 


140  THOUGHTS. 

"  The  good  man  ! .  .  .  And  the  little  girl  ?  " 
"The  little  one  suffers  no  longer." 
"  Really  ?  " 
"Dead!  dead!" 

XXXV. 

The  war  of  the  slaves  in  Italy,  the  war  of  the 
serfs  in  France,  have  bequeathed  to  history  a 
particularly  mournful  memory.  .  .  . 

Oh,  ye  who  rob  the  peasant  of  his  beliefs  and 
his  money,  stuffing  his  pocket  with  vile  journals 
and  his  heart  with  brutal  desires,  beware  of  the 
reprisals  which  he  will  owe  you  for  having  put 
him  back  into  slavery,  into  servitude ! 

xxxvi. 

"  Spare  whom  ?  This  virtuous  man  ?  A  vir- 
tuous man  is  inoffensive.  This  wicked  man  ? 
Yes,  he  may  injure  me."  .  .  . 

Thus  speaks  every  peasant. 

XXXVII. 

A  heavy  rain  has  been  falling  since  yester- 
day. 

Rain  is  dismal  in  the  country. 

Here  there  is  no  one  to  converse  with  :  the 
isolation  is  absolute. 

A  certain  description  of  Washington  Irving 
haunts  my  memory ;  it  concerns  a  traveller  who 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  141 

has  been  detained  in  a  country  tavern  by  a  rain 
storm.  Ah !  how  well  that  rain  is  expressed  ! 
One  sees  it,  one  hears  it  falling  and  disappearing 
in  the  water  beneath  the  eaves  ;  and  the  ennui 
of  the  gentleman  becomes  the  ennui  of  the 
charmed  reader. 

My  ennui  is  not  reflected,  nor  that  which 
comes  from  pleasure.  I  do  not  read  the  ennui 
of  another  person ;  I  feel  my  own.  It  is  less 
poetical.  .  .  . 

Behold  me  alone  amid  the  depths  of  night, 
alone  amid  the  heavy  rain  which  makes  the 
young  leaves  rustle.  The  nightingale,  newly 
come,  ceases  her  moan  beneath  this  sullen  rain  ; 
a  warm  summer  rain  would  not  thus  benumb 
her.  The  moon,  instead  of  rolling  through  the 
clear  firmament  round  and  splendid  as  the  silver 
wheel  of  some  mysterious  chariot,  —  the  moon 
drags  herself  wearily  behind  the  opaque  clouds. 

There  are  those  who  journey  very  far,  to  seek 
solitude  and  silence.  I  have  found  these  last, 
poor  me,  without  so  much  trouble,  and  more 
profound,  more  persevering,  than  my  desire.  .  .  . 

I  have  not  lived  yet,  not  yet  have  I  acted ;  all 
the  little  which  I  have  been  able  to  undertake, 
has  always  burst  in  my  hand. 

In  former  days,  unoccupied  in  spite  of  myself, 
I  still  hoped.  . .  . 

To-day,  too  old  by  ten  years,  I  hope  no  more. 


142  THOUGHTS. 

No  past :  no  future. 

I  have  always  desired  to  live  intellectually, 
ideally,  divinely ;  and  I  have  never  done  any- 
thing but  vegetate  and  languish !  .  .  . 

The  depths  of  the  country  !  the  depths  of  the 
province !  the  vilest  of  men  in  the  vilest  of 
lands !  ,  .  . 

I  do  not  wish,  in  saying  this,  to  set  at  naught 
my  dear  Limousin,  nor  to  scorn  myself,  a  man, 
a  Christian,  and  a  priest.  But  do  you  see  where 
and  what  I  am  ?     A  nothing  in  nothingness. 

Many  console  me  .  .  .  lamentable  consolation  ! 
Thus  do  people  console  and  amuse  a  dying  man, 
by  trying  to  persuade  him  of  what  they  them- 
selves doubt. 

XXXVIII. 

Three  sorts  of  people  die  without  affectation : 
the  priest,  the  soldier,  and  the  peasant. 

xxxix. 

A  monster  has  lately  come  into  existence : 
the  infidel  peasant. 

XL. 

Peasants  are  caught  by  the  mouth,  like  fish. 

XLI. 

The  last  to  cling  to  dying  nations  are  the 
priest,  out  of  love,  the  peasant,  from  force  of 
habit. 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 43 


XLII. 


A  certain  peasant  would  have  passed  for  less 
acute  had  he  been  thought  less  stupid. 


XLIII. 

The  peasant  refers  everything  to  the  mouth, 
like  little  children. 

XL1V. 

The  peasant  passed  from  paganism  to  Chris- 
tianity through  great  expenditure  of  miracles ; 
he  would  return  from  Christianity  to  paganism 
at  a  less  cost. 

XLV. 

A  peasant  is  a  man  very  much  as  a  block  of 
marble  is  a  statue. 

XLVI. 

The  peasant  has  two  words  to  designate  the 
companion  of  his  life :  femena,  femna.  The 
"femna"  is  only  the  female  of  man;  the  "fem- 
ena  "  is  also  the  female  of  the  animal.  On  this 
score,  my  "femena"  should  be  employed  but 
little,  or  not  at  all.  It  is,  nevertheless,  the 
favorite  term. 

XLVII. 

Children,  women,  and  peasants  like  to  be 
flattered,  which  is  as  much  as  to  say,  that  they 
like  to  be  deceived. 


144  THOUGHTS. 


XLVIII. 


The  city  does  not  take  away,  neither  does  the 
country  give,  solitude  ;  solitude  is  within  us. 


XLIX. 


If  we  search  well  in  the  subsoil  of  many  a 
peasant,  we  shall  end  by  discovering  a  certain 
superior  sense,  which  is  difficult  of  explanation, 
but  which  must  be  admitted. 


"The  fatherland!"  A  fine  word,  certainly, 
and  one  which  sounds  well,  and  which  makes 
everyone  start  up,  except  the  peasant.  In  order 
to  make  the  peasant  rise  up  in  his  might,  cry : 
"  Thy  house,  thy  fields,  thy  money !  .  .  .  be- 
ware !  .  . .  " 

LI. 

The  peasant  dies  of  hunger  all  his  life  that  he 
may  have  something  to  live  on  after  his  death. 

LII. 

Far  away,  yonder,  the  sky  appears  all  red. 

"  It  is  the  sunset,"  says  the  man. 

Wrong !  it  is  his  house  on  fire ! 

One  of  those  wretches,  so  many  of  whom  pass 
among  us  nowadays,  set  a  fuse  beneath  the 
door,  and  the  house  has  burst  into  flames. 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  145 

The  man  darts  forward,  crying,  "  Fire ! "  .  .  . 

Then  he  bethinks  himself,  halts  at  a  reasona- 
ble distance,  crouches  down  on  the  trunk  of  a 
tree,  listening  to  see  if  anyone  is  coming,  and 
wishing  that  they  may  come  too  late : 

The  house  is  insured  ! 

Meanwhile  the  alarm-bell  bleats  ;  people  rush 
from  the  neighboring  villages  :  "  The  furniture  ? 
Come!" 

The  man  stirs  not,  makes  no  reply. 

The  furniture  is  insured  ! 

So  burn  on  in  peace,  ye  cupboards  and  chests 
of  his  ancestors ;  burn,  bridal  bed,  and  cradle 
lately  cold  ;  burn,  picture  of  the  Virgin  Mary, 
patron  of  the  dead  wife !  (Alas  !  he  will  soon 
replace  her,  when  his  house  is  once  rebuilt.  .  .) 
burn,  military  tunic  !  burn,  little  frame  of  his 
first  communion.  Souvenirs  of  glory,  of  love, 
and  of  grief,  souvenirs  ancient  and  recent,  burn 
on  in  peace : 

He  is  insured ! 

LIII. 

Our  peasants  tolerate  God  well :  "  He  is  not 
there,  if  he  is  anywhere,  and  besides,  he  de- 
mands neither  gold  nor  silver."  On  the  other 
hand,  they  endure  but  ill  the  men  of  God,  the 
pope,  the  bishop,  the  cure.  .  .  . 

To  tell  the  truth,  they  would  tolerate  their 
other  masters  still  less  if  they  dared  ! 


146  THOUGHTS. 


LIV. 


"What,  shall  he,  the  peasant,  who  needs 
everything,  pay  the  cur6  who  needs  nothing  !  "  . . . 
Idiotic  reasoning.  Admirable  reason  !  thinks 
the  peasant. 

LV. 

The  peasant  never  takes  a  walk. 
The  peasant  gives  his  arm  to  his  wife,  for  the 
first  and  last  time,  on  their  wedding-day. 


LVI. 


To  sell  no  matter  what,  no  matter  how,  to  no 
matter  whom  ;  behold  in  three  words  the  whole 
diplomacy  of  the  peasant  at  the  fair. 


LVII. 

The  peasant  has  a  second  home,  where  he 
enjoys  himself  no  less  than  in  the  other,  and  it 
is  the  fair  ground. 

LVIII. 

The  peasant,  as  soon  as  he  arrives  at  the  fair, 
ceases  to  be  a  Christian,  to  be  a  man.  He  is  a 
spider  in  the  centre  of  his  web.  Neither  the 
voice  of  blood,  friendship,  nor  respect  is  any- 
thing to  him  any  longer.  "  In  war  one  must 
adopt  the  methods  of  war !  at  the  fair  the 
methods  of  the  fair  ! "     One  is  conscious  that 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 47 

he  feels  resolved  to  sell  as  quickly  and  ac  dearly 
as  possible,  to  cheat  even  his  neighbor,  even 
his  own  father  and  mother ! 

LIX. 

Absenteeism  and  Malthusianism  are  visibly 
depopulating  our  country  districts.  The  Natchez 
and  the  Mohican  have  had  their  turn.  The 
next  subject  for  a  book  will  be:  "The  Last  of 
the  Peasants  !  " 

LX. 

The  petty  peasant  who  wishes  to  acquire  a 
competency ;  the  peasant  in  easy  circumstances 
who  wishes  to  found  a  family ;  the  ex-peasant 
who  wishes  to  become  monsieur.  Malthus  fur- 
nishes the  law  for  all  of  you,  does  he  not  ?  .  .  . 

LXI. 

In  spite  of  the  fact  that  they  are  still  young, 
they  will  have  but  one  son. 

And  this  son,  a  spoiled  child  like  every  only 
son,  has  come  near  perishing  beneath  a  crum- 
bling wall,  in  his  turbulence  and  rashness. 

"It  would  have  been  a  lesson  for  the  par- 
ents ! "  said  a  villager,  who  witnessed  the  affair, 
with  a  mysterious  smile. 

LXII. 

If  the  ex-peasant  is  father  to  a  male  child  first 
of  all,  it  is  enough !     If  he  has  only  daughters, 


148  THOUGHTS. 

he  will  persevere  until:  the  arrival  of  a  boy. 
This  tardy  son  will  be  the  eldest,  the  only  child, 
to  speak  rightly.  The  rest  will  stir  only  at 
his  beck  and  call.  He  will  have  as  many  ser- 
vants as  he  has  sisters.  None  of  them  will  get 
settled,  all  will  devote  themselves  to  monsieur, 
their  brother,  and  to  his  wife.  If  one  of  them 
speaks  of  taking  the  veil,  there  is  a  long  suit  to 
argue.  The  good  father  is  inexhaustible  in 
whys  and  hows.  "  So  you  no  longer  love  me  ? " 
he  sighs ;  then,  "  Who  will  counsel,  guide, 
take  care  of  your  poor  brother  ? "  .  .  .  Then  he 
begins  to  discourse  about  the  clergy  who  tear 
children  from  their  family,  and  to  rage  against 
that  "  era  of  ignorance  and  fanaticism,  abolished 
by  the  great  revolution,  when  the  victims  of  the 
cloister  .  .  .  etc.  ..."  The  vocation  will  be 
finely  tempered  if  it  does  not  break  in  this  as- 
sault of  sensibility  and  hypocrisy  ! 

LXIII. 

"  Scratch  the  Russian,"  said  Napoleon,  "  and 
the  Tartar  will  reappear."  And  you,  ye  people 
who  favor  obligatory  instruction,  polish  and 
varnish  the  peasant  as  much  as  you  please,  the 
"peccata"  will  still  remain;  and  it  is  fortunate 
that  it  is  so,  since  you  must  eat  bread. 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 49 


LXIV. 

The  saint  tastes  death,  the  philosopher  drinks 
it,  the  peasant  swallows  it. 

LXV. 

The  peasant  of  the  olden  time  revolted  a  pro- 
pos  of  everything,  d  propos  of  nothing;  the 
modern  peasant  does  not  revolt ;  he  hardly  com- 
plains :  he  has  universal  suffrage,  a  pretty  toy, 
to  divert  his  attention. 

LXVI. 

"  Liable  to  villain-tax  and  contribution  of 
forced  labor  at  pleasure  !  .  .  .  "  Thus  spoke  the 
ancient  law  as  it  is  maintained.  The  modern 
law  does  not  speak :  too  much  speaking  does 
harm.  It  is  a  quicker  matter  to  load  down  "  the 
beast  with  a  thousand  heads,"  to  load  it  again, 
to  load  it  without  end.  The  modern  law  is  very 
sly. 

LXVII. 

The  hygienist :  "  Air  as  well  as  bread  is  of  the 
first  importance  ;  air,  windows,  my  good  man  !  " 
—  "Yes,  sir." 

The  collector  :  "  So  many  openings,  so  many 
taxes  :  pay  up  !  "  —  "  Yes,  sir !  .  .  ." 

Whereupon,  stopping  up  three  windows  out  of 
four :  — 


150  THOUGHTS. 

"No  more  air  for  me,  no  more  light,  nor 
health,  nor  joy,  except  out  of  doors,  beneath  the 
sky  of  the  good  God  ! "  says  the  peasant  with  a 
sigh. 

LXVIII. 

"  .  .  .  Our  fathers  cried  out  when  they  were 
deprived  of  a  tithe,  a  tenth  of  their  revenues ; 
and  you,  you  pay  three  and  four  tithes.  .  .  ." 

Who  speaks  thus  ?  Dreux-Br^ze  in  a  manda- 
mus ?  Dupanloup  in  a  pamphlet  ?  Rochefort, 
Veuillot  or  Cassagnac  in  an  article  ?  .  .  . 

This  language  comes  from  a  child  of  the 
people,  from  a  great  manufacturer  who  is  fond 
of  convincing  a  man  of  madness  in  order  that  he 
may  deign  to  allow  himself  to  be  healed,  that 
poor  Jean  Guetre,  who  "  has  been  invoking  thee 
for  thousands  and  hundreds  of  years,  oh,  repub- 
lic of  the  peasants  ?  " 

LXIX. 

Our  peasants  never  return  from  the  city  with- 
out a  loaf  of  white  bread,  with  which  to  regale 
themselves  in  the  bosom  of  their  family.  This 
gentleman  bread  chewed  slowly,  respectfully,  so 
to  speak,  possesses  for  them  the  savor  of  for- 
bidden fruit,  although  they  esteem  black  bread, 
their  own  bread,  more  invigorating  and  more 
healthful. 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  \^i 


LXX. 

For  the  peasant,  the  word  Christian  is  sy- 
nonymous with  the  word  tnan.  Admirable  ac- 
ceptation, in  which  the  informing  spirit  of  the 
church  makes  itself  plainly  felt. 

LXXI. 

The  rural  postman.  Ye  city  folk,  accustomed 
to  be  spoiled  by  the  post  which  coddles  you  at 
all  hours,  you  have  no  idea  of  the  great  place 
which  the  rural  postman  occupies  in  the  exist- 
ence of  us  country  people  ;  with  what  impatience 
he  is  expected,  and  with  what  emotion  he  is 
greeted  when  he  makes  his  appearance  once  a 
day,  with  his  regulation  cap,  his  blue  blouse, 
and  that  leather  sack  which  contains  so  many 
secrets ! 

One  is  uneasy  and  hopeful  while  one  is  young. 
One  still  believes  in  long  memories  and  lucky 
chances.  "I  may  suddenly  learn  that  I  have 
ceased  to  be  useless  and  obscure.  Providence  is 
a  good  mother.  Fortune  is  blind,  they  say ;  on 
that  score  she  is  free  from  partiality.  Perhaps  I 
have  at  length  won  in  that  lottery  the  prize  which 
is  drawn  now  by  this  person,  now  by  that,  amid 
the  throng,  and  which  introduces  him  abruptly 
from  the  waiting-room  where  one  pines  away,  to 
the  hall  of  honor  promised  to  the  fortunate." 


152  THOUGHTS. 

A  knock.  It  is  he !  I  open  quickly.  And 
letters,  journals,  pamphlets  fill  my  hands.  A 
general  curiosity  is  followed  by  a  curiosity,  re- 
stricted in  limits,  but  all  the  more  lively. 

I  carry  my  prize  aside.  Naturally,  I  run  over 
the  most  interesting.  .  .  . 

What  is  there  new  in  Paris,  that  capricious 
and  terrible  city  ?  And  my  poor  little  native 
town,  so  humble  in  France,  so  great  in  my 
heart,  is  it  tranquil?  Such  an  one  is  ill,  such 
another  is  dead.  .  .  .  The  dearest  friend  of  my 
childhood  is  to  be  married  :  joy  and  patience  to 
the  new  couple!  .  .  . 

The  postman  has  taken  his  departure  after 
wishing  me  "  Good  evening,"  to  which  in  my 
abstraction,  I  make  but  slight  reply.  Before  his 
coming  I  hoped,  I  feared.  I  shall  begin  again 
in  the  same  way  to-morrow  and  always  :  to  fear, 
to  hope,  is  not  this  all  of  life  ?  And  does  man 
do  anything  else  on  the  earth  except  wait  al- 
ways for  a  happiness  which  never  comes  ? 

The  world  which  is  within  me,  has  been 
troubled  from  thought  to  thought,  like  a  deep 
sheet  of  water,  from  undulation  to  undulation  ; 
my  soul  is  different  from  what  it  was  a  moment 
ago  ;  things  change  around  me. 

Thus  a  humble  postman  binds  my  solitude  to 
the  entire  universe ;  thanks  to  him,  nothing 
human  is  foreign  to  me.     A  poor  man  who  sus-. 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 53 

pects  nothing,  produces  this  profound  impres- 
sion on  my  heart ;  the  voice  of  this  wretched 
being  vies  with  a  fine  piece  of  music  or  a  power- 
ful poem  in  agitating  me. 

LXXII. 

"O  priests,  these  peasants  to  whom  you 
preach  incessantly,  seem  none  the  better  for 
it  !  "  .  .  . 

It  is  true.  But  oh  !  how  soon  they  would 
appear  worse,  if  we  preached  to  them  rarely  or 
never  ! 

LXXIII. 

Obscure  germ,  remain  beneath  the  earth. 
Why  shouldst  thou  wish  to  come  forth  and  to 
blossom  ?  Thou  dreamest  of  the  sun,  the  breeze, 
the  dew.  Alas !  the  sun  scorches,  the  breeze 
harasses,  the  dew  crushes  down  and  soils.  In 
the  broad  daylight  trouble,  not  peace,  awaits 
thee ;  pain,  not  joy ;  and  if  some  glory  is  prom- 
ised to  thee,  it  will  be  vain  and  brief.  .  .  .  Re- 
main beneath  the  earth,  obscure  germ. 

I  will  be  a  flower,  I  must  be  a  flower.  Ordeal 
for  ordeal,  'tis  better  to  suffer  in  the  light  than 
in  the  shadow.  For  I  suffer  here.  And  I  do 
not  find  it  true,  that  isolation  is  happiness. 
Night  surrounds  me,  the  earth  oppresses  me,  the 
worm  affronts  me.  Desire,  above  all,  is  killing 
me.     I  must  be  a  flower,  I  will  be  a  flower. 


154  THOUGHTS. 

LXXIV. 

The  peasant  loves  the  city  and  detests  the 
citizen  ;  the  citizen  loves  the  country  and  de- 
tests the  peasant. 

LXXV. 

A  stone  detaches  itself  from  the  wall  and 
rolls  to  the  middle  of  the  road.  .  .  .  Who  will 
pick  it  up  ?  Who  will  restore  it  to  its  place  ? 
The  stone  is  there,  says  the  peasant  to  himself; 
let  it  stay  there !  It  is  a  question  of  passing 
over  or  around  it.  One  year  later,  ten  years 
later  the  stone  will  still  occupy  the  same  spot, 
like  the  god  Terminus. 

LXXVI. 

May  the  good  God  grant  me  some  day  to  quit 
the  country,  and  thenceforth,  the  country,  viewed 
through  my  memories,  through  my  regrets,  will 
perhaps  have  charms  for  me ;  like  the  faces  of 
parents  who  were  harsh  to  us,  and  which  appear 
to  us  so  gentle  to  gaze  upon,  when  they  are  no 
more ! 

LXXVII. 

Some  one  has  accused  me  of  reproaching  the 
peasant  with  lack  of  patriotism ;  that  some  one 
has  not  understood  me. 

No,  the  peasant  will  not  rise  to  defend  that 
which  neither  his  hand  nor  his  intelligence  can 
touch  !     Country  is  a  word  which  signifies  noth- 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  155 

ing  to  him.  What  you  call  Country,  you  men 
who  know,  is  a  thing  which  interests  him  but 
little,  poor  ignorant  creature ! 

Nevertheless  he  has  a  country,  which  is  not 
the  whole  of  the  other,  but  which  is  a  part  of  it. 

The  child  clings  to  its  mother,  by  clinging  to 
the  skirt  of  her  dress.  The  peasant  who  takes 
the  trouble  to  defend  his  land,  his  hearth,  his 
village,  takes  the  trouble  at  the  same  time  to 
defend  the  country.  I  have  not  said  that  the 
peasant  was  not  patriotic.  A  little  more  and  I 
would  affirm  that  he  is  as  much  so,  after  his  fash- 
ion, as  thou,  thou  tiller  of  paper ! 

LXXVIII. 

Our  country  districts  are  difficult  to  traverse. 
One  must  pass  through  meadows,  fields,  forests, 
everywhere  except  along  the  roads.  These  nar- 
row, tortuous  roads,  with  their  embankments, 
make  one  think  of  the  Styx  and  of  Erebus,  so 
full  are  they  of  black,  liquid,  tainted  mud :  Styx 
atra. 

Our  people,  shod  with  wooden  shoes  higher 
than  the  antique  cothurnus,  leap  from  one  stone 
to  another  without  stumbling,  almost  without 
looking,  and  swaying  from  side  to  side.  Imag- 
ine giants  with  a  boat  on  each  foot  by  way  of 
shoes.  The  idea  of  paving  the  road,  in  order  to 
remove  the  obstacle,  never  occurs  to  them. 


156  THOUGHTS. 


LXXIX. 

The  countryman  is  less  slow  in  sending  for 
the  veterinary  for  his  beasts  than  for  the  doctor 
for  himself.  Ah  !  when  the  doctor  is  summoned, 
the  sick  man  is  very  sick  indeed !  Fifteen 
francs  a  visit  is  still  another  malady !  and  "  ill- 
ness upon  illness  is  not  health  !  " 

LXXX. 

He  passes  by,  drunken  with  pride  and  perhaps 
with  brandy,  brandishing  a  vote. 

I  am  tempted  to  cry  out :  "  Stop  him !  he  is 
mad !  he  is  armed !  he  is  going  to  commit  an 
evil  deed  !  "  .  .  . 

Poor  good  man,  sold  for  a  full  bottle  or  an 
empty  promise,  to  the  Michel  Morins  and  to  the 
Robert  Macaires  of  politics  !  Poor  good  Chris- 
tian, who  gives  his  voice  to  the  breakers  of  the 
cross,  to  the  la'fcizers  of  schools,  of  hospitals,  of 
churches !  Poor  dear  parishioner,  faithful  to 
mass  on  Sunday,  and  to  his  communion  on 
Easter,  obstinate,  nevertheless,  in  upholding  the 
devourers  of  cur6s  !  . .  . 

LXXXI. 

The  peasant  still  lives  under  the  law  of  fear  ; 
the  law  of  love  is  a  dead  letter  to  him. 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 57 

LXXXII. 

The  peasant  limits  his  duty  to  keeping  the 
house  in  bread.  All  other  household  needs  are 
as  though  they  did  not  exist.  "The  little  one 
must  have  a  dress,"  says  the  mother. — "A 
dress  !  a  dress  !  .  .  .  Then  make  one  out  of  one 
of  your  cast-off  gowns  ! "  —  "I  have  used  up 
everything  long  ago,  and  the  rags  in  which  I 
-now  drag  about  every  day  are  all  that  I  have 
left !  "  —  "  Enough !  The  little  money  which  I 
have,  I  need  for  myself!  .  .  ."  And  the  poor 
woman,  having  drained  all  her  resources,  ex- 
hausted all  expedients,  daring  neither  to  borrow 
nor  to  beg  (for  their  house  is  a  prosperous  house), 
resigns  herself  to  stealing  in  her  own  home  ;  and 
she  sells,  secretly,  butter,  poultry,  wheat,  etc.,  to 
save  the  honor  of  her  family  ! 

LXXXIII. 

"The  hail  has  played  its  usual  pranks:  the 
Saint  Michael,  our  best  harvest,  is  lost ;  the  red 
wheat  dispersed  to  the  four  winds  of  heaven ; 
the  buckwheat  cut  to  pieces,  crushed,  and  soiled  ; 
of  the  dung-heap,  what !  Th'e  few  grapes  which 
had  come  out,  scarcely  enough  to  make  a  little 
dreg-wine,  trampled  down  as  if  in  a  vat ! " 

"  There  is  some  spell  in  it." 

"  Some  spell  ?  I  understand.  But  who  has 
cast  the  spell  ?  " 


158  THOUGHTS. 

"  I  do  not  wish  to  sin,  but  .  .  ." 
"  H6  !  speak,  you  ceremonious  woman." 
"  Here  then  :  I  have  been  told  —  I  did  not  see 
it  —  that  M.  le  Cure  of  X stopped  at  Font- 
Vive,  under  the  pretext  of  watering  his  horse. 
The  horse  was  a  long  time  drinking.  It  was  as 
hot  as  an  oven  yesterday  ;  and  the  cure  plunged 
his  arms  into  the  basin  up  to  the  elbow,  and  then 
he  shook  them,  as  though  he  were  shaking  a 
holy-water  sprinkler,  and  then  he  looked  at  the 
sky,  and  moved  his  lips  ;  then  he  dipped  his 
handkerchief  in  the  water  and  wrung  it.  What 
he  murmured  was  not  quite  understood,  but 
people  thought  they  heard  the  word  "  Storm." 
"  Really  ?  .  .  .  Ah  !  it  is  he  who  brought  the 
hail !  .  .  ." 

"  Surely.  Everybody  knows  that  cures  bring 
hail.  My  husband  has  often  ridiculed  me  for 
doubting  it,  in  the  beginning.  .  .  ." 

And  our  fiddle-faddles  in  Paris  say  in  print, 
that,  as  soon  as  the  peasant  is  taught  to  read 
and  write,  he  is  in  the  way  of  progress  ;  and  that 
in  less  than  fifteen  years  he  will  be  lacking  in 
nothing !  And  people  talk  of  the  ignorance  of 
the  olden  times,  of  the  superstitions  of  the  Mid- 
dle Ages,  as  though  ignorance  and  superstitions 
did  not  exist  always,  everywhere,  —  the  weeds  of 
that  more  or  less  cultivated  garden  which  is 
called  human   society ! 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  159 

LXXXIV. 

This  peasant  has  discovered  a  very  ingenious 
means  of  enriching  himself,  which  is  to  lend 
out,  at  interest,  money  which  he  has  borrowed 
gratis. 

LXXXV. 

After  a  frost  which  changes  the  green  mantle 
of  spring  into  soiled  and  pendant  rags,  after  a 
storm  which  slashes  vines,  wheat,  and  fruit-trees, 
those  adornments  of  summer,  those  treasures  of 
autumn,  the  poor  peasant,  suddenly  robbed  of 
his  labors,  is  truly  fine  to  contemplate :  "  God 
has  given,  God  has  taken  away ;  blessed  be  his 
holy  name."  This  word  of  Job  is  not  on  his  lips  ; 
he  does  not  know  it ;  but  this  word  is  contained 
in  his  resigned  silence.  A  marvellous  subject 
for  a  picture,  the  peasant  surveying  his  kingdom, 
which  has  been  laid  waste  by  a  storm ! 

Nevertheless,  to  be  exact,  revolts  do  arise  here 
and  there,  revolts  which  are  sometimes  satanic ! 
Shall  I  say  it  ?  Madmen  have  been  seen  shak- 
ing their  fist  at  heaven,  or  even  levelling  their  gun, 
loaded  with  ball,  at  the  zenith,  and  firing  without 
a  movement  of  the  eyelids,  in  order  to  hurl  dead 
from  his  throne  Him  who  reigns  on  high ! 

LXXXVI. 

The  peasant  lacks  simplicity,  through  igno- 
rance and  false  taste.     If  he  sings,  his  song  is 


l60  THOUGHTS. 

silly,  it  is  not  simple ;  if  he  dresses,  it  is  not 
simply,  but  strikingly,  offensively,  grotesquely ; 
if  he  builds,  nothing  is  put  in  its  place,  all  is  out  of 
proportion,  without  convenience  or  beauty.  Give 
a  peasant  a  long  and  broad  piece  of  cloth,  a  spa- 
cious piece  of  ground,  instead  of  a  simple  coat, 
a  vast  house,  he  will  cut  and  build  for  himself 
some  scanty,  complicated  thing,  I  know  not 
what,  where  his  mind  will  be  at  ease  just  in 
proportion  as  his  body  is  under  constraint. 

LXXXVII. 

The  most  intolerable  creature  to  the  peasant 
who  farms  on  shares  is  .  .  .  the  collector  ?  —  No. 
—  The  bailiff  ?  —  No.  —  The  marauder  ?  —  You 
have  not  guessed  it  yet  ;  it  is  the  proprietor  of 
the  farm,  a  funded  gentleman  of  recent  date, 
an  artisan,  who  has  grown  rich,  who  knows  no 
other  pleasure  at  present  than"  handling  the 
spade,  driving  the  plough,  planting,  sowing, 
and,  above  all,  giving  advice.  The  poor  peas- 
ant has  him  always  before  or  behind  him,  like 
his  shadow.  "  Such  a  thing  must  be  finished, 
such  another  must  be  begun  ;  this  must  be  done 
thus  or  otherwise ;  pay  attention  to  this  or  to 
that.  .  .  ."  The  rustic  boor  becomes  irritable, 
fretful.  .  .  .  With  great  difficulty  does  he  re- 
strain himself:  a  forced  smile,  an  equivocal 
assent,  serve  him  for  a  reply.     At  evening,  he 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  l6l 

returns  home  more  weary  than  is  his  wont,  full 
of  secret  grumbling,  and  committing  the  gentle- 
man to  all  the  fiends,  under  his  breath. 

LXXXVIII. 

The  spot  is  fertile ;  the  wheat  elbows  the 
vine ;  the  chestnut  and  walnut  are  neighbors 
to  the  apple  and  the  peach  ;  maize  and  buck- 
wheat grow  side  by  side.  The  stables  are  full  of 
cows,  pigs,  and  lambs  ;  the  poultry-yards  are 
peopled  with  chickens  ;  milk,  eggs,  butter,  and 
cheese  abound ;  "  Comfort  and  ease  dwell 
here,"  you  think.  Wrong.  Ask  the  notary; 
question  the  huckster  ;  and  one  will  admit  that 
he  can  no  longer  get  enough  money  to  lend  ; 
and  the  other  will  confess  that  ruin  frequents 
the  country,  and  that  one  would  never  suspect 
the  poverty  which  afflicts  nearly  every  family, 
even  those  who  have  the  appearance  and  the 
reputation  for  wealth.  .  .  . 

And  yet  the  peasant  of  to-day  makes  money 
out  of  everything  ;  everything,  except  wheat,  is 
sold  at  a  high  price.  Forty  years  ago  a  louis 
d'or  was  a  rarity  ;  a  -bank-note  was  a  curiosity ; 
old  men  had  never  seen  one.  In  our  day,  gold- 
pieces  are  as  common  as  the  stones  of  the  high- 
way ;  paper  money  flutters  about  like  leaves 
from  the  trees  ;   and   poverty  is  everywhere. 

Let  him  explain  this  who  can. 


1 62  THOUGHTS. 

LXXXIX. 

No  one,  after  the  priest,  approaches  nearer 
the  divinity  than  the  peasant. 

xc. 

Matheline,  at  first  sight,  is  like  any  other 
peasant.  A  gown  of  serge,  a  cape  of  red  cot- 
ton, a  head-dress  of  coarse  cloth.  .  .  .  Could 
anything  be  less  elegant  ?  But  look  at  her  face  ; 
observe  it  well :  does  it  not  remind  you  of  the 
Pieta  of  Michael  Angelo  ? 

It  is  a  thin,  pale  face,  framed  in  flame- 
colored  hair,  streaked  here  and  there  with 
threads  of  silver.  Wrinkles  furrow  her  brow, 
her  temples,  her  cheeks ;  those  wrinkles  are 
not  all  the  work  of  time  ;  grief,  that  mysterious 
worker,  has  hollowed  out  a  portion  of  them  ; 
the  bluish  gray  eyes,  veiled  by  tawny  lashes, 
shine  with  calm  energy.  The  whole  physiog- 
nomy inspires  respect,  would  almost  inspire 
fear,  were  it  not  that  goodness  and  gentleness 
dwell  in  the  folds  of  her  lips,  like  doves  in 
crevices  of  the  rocks. 

For  Matheline  is  a  brave  woman.  She  is 
called,  and  with  justice,  the  Angel  of  the  cot- 
tage, the  Apostle  of  the  village,  the  counsel  and 
comfort  of  all. 

Her  husband  would  have  been  a  poor  man, 
without  virtue,  if  not  without  vice.     He  loved 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 63 

the  bottle  ;  and  what  ills  the  bottle  contains ! 
It  is  the  box  of  Pandora  minus  hope.  Mathe- 
line,  by  dint  of  smiles  and  tears  —  smiles  for  the 
man,  tears  before  God  —  succeeded  in  grafting  a 
Christian  conscience  upon  that  gross  nature, 
and  making  him  bring  forth,  oh,  miracle  !  fruits 
of  probity  and  honor. 

Matheline  has  three  children,  a  boy  and  two 
girls.  The  eldest,  Tissette,  will  marry  when 
and  how  her  parents  desire  ;  the  other,  Noreille, 
is  only  awaiting  an  opportunity  to  become  a 
Little  Sister  of  the  Poor ;  the  young  man,  who 
came  into  the  world  a  little  in  advance  of 
Noreille,  and  long  after  Tissette,  will  continue 
the  house.  Tissette  commands,  by  right  of  birth, 
this  brother  and  sister,  who  like  to  call  her 
"  little  mamma,"  to  tease  her.  In  truth,  she  is 
like  a  second  mother  to  them,  resembling  the 
other  both  in  heart  and  face. 

During  the  week,  the  father  goes  off  to  work 
in  the  fields,  the  children  go  to  the  woods  as 
guards.    Matheline  parts  from  them  with  regret. 

Left  alone  (and  it  must  be  so  !),  the  day  seems 
long,  so  long,  to  her !  Finally,  at  night,  they 
return,  weary  and  joyous.  She  stands  on  the 
threshold  waiting  for  them,  she  questions  them, 
urges  them  on  :  "  Quick,  be  quick,  the  soup  is 
served,  come !  .  .  ."  After  the  porridge,  come 
"  truffles "    (this    is    our    peasants'    name    for 


1 64  THOUGHTS. 

potatoes).  They  eat  much  bread  and  drink  a 
little  wine.  Then  the  family  gathers  about  the 
hearth,  on  which  a  fire  burns"  at  all  seasons  for 
the  warm  mash  of  the  "merchandise"  (this  is 
the  term  for  the  cattle  which  are  being  fattened). 
Then  they  shell  the  chestnuts  for  the  first  meal 
on  the  following  day ;  then  they  go  down  to  the 
stable  to  milk  the  cows ;  then  they  kneel  in 
prayer ;  then  each  betakes  himself  to  his  cham- 
ber :  "  Farewell  !  until  to-morrow  !  .  .  ."  The 
whole  day  was  toil ;  the  whole  night  will  be  sleep. 
On  Sundays  there  is  a  great  vigil  from  five 
o'clock  until  midnight.  Matheline  will  not  kill 
time:  she  prefers  to  enliven  and  sanctify  it. 
The  neighbors  seek  the  hospitality  of  this 
house.  Nevertheless,  all  are  not  received  in- 
discriminately. Away  with  swearers,  libertines, 
and  insolent  persons  !  Silence,  all  gossip  and  in- 
trigue !  And  the  Man  relates,  for  the  hundredth 
time,  the  things  of  old,  the  Dragon,  the  Bere,  the 
Werewolf,  the  Spectre  Hunt ;  Matheline  has  a 
weakness  for  Genevieve  of  Nanterre,  Isidore 
the  Laborer,  Pascal  Baylon,  and  Germaine 
of  Pibrac.  .  .  .  Tissette,  and  especially  No- 
reille,  recite  Sacred  History,  the  Gospels,  the 
Catechism.  .  .  .  The  canticles  prevent  yawns 
or  sleep.  The  canticles?  and  nothing  else? 
Yes !  There  are  also  chestnuts  roasted  in  the 
ashes !  cider !  and  sometimes,  sometimes,  claret 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 65 

sent  by  some  unknown  person,  Monsieur  le 
Cure,  no  doubt !  .  .  . 

Of  course,  none  of  the  watchers  has  missed 
mass  or  vespers.  Matheline  has  but  a  poor 
opinion  of  any  one  who  does  not  honor  the 
Lord  God.  She  and  hers  set  an  example  of 
Christian  fidelity.  The  boy  accompanies  the 
father  to  church.  Matheline  betakes  herself 
thither,  in  her  turn,  between  her  daughters. 
The  people  range  themselves  in  rows  as  they 
pass,  and  murmur,  "  Happy  mother !  happy 
daughters  !  .  .  ."  When  they  come  out,  they 
go  about  among  the  groups,  but  not  for  long,  to 
inquire  about  some  relative,  a  friend,  an  invalid, 
or  some  poor  person.  .  ,  . 

For  Matheline  is  the  providence  of  the  coun- 
try. All  needy  people  bless  her.  A  man  has 
cleft  his  skull,  while  gathering  cherries  —  who 
will  dress  it  ?  A  woman  has  been  taken  ill  — 
who  will  pass  the  night  with  her  ?  This  widow 
has  lost  her  son  in  Tonquin  — who  will  comfort 
her?  Matheline.  Where,  pray,  does  she  who 
has  to  earn  her  own  living,  who  has  hardly 
read,  and  who  considers  herself  the  most  insig- 
nificant person  in  the  parish,  get  the  numerous 
alms  which  she  bestows,  the  wise  words  which 
she  utters,  the  noble  and  delicate  sentiments 
which  she  exhibits  ?  Where  ?  From  her  faith. 
Oh,  the  good  woman  !    oh,  the  holy  woman  ! 


1 66  THOUGHTS. 


XCI. 


The  poor  child  was  at  the  point  of  death.  A 
candle  had  been  lighted  in  honor  of  the  sacred 
Host,  and  also  to  permit  a  little  sight  within 
that  black  cavern.  Those  present  knelt  upon 
the  damp  earth.  My  eyes  became  impercepti- 
bly used  to  the  darkness,  and  I  could  at  length 
discern  the  objects  around  me.  The  little  cow- 
herd lay  upon  a  trestle-bed  of  badly  joined 
boards  ;  a  truss  of  straw  served  for  his  pillow  ; 
a  tattered  packing-cloth  was  his  sheet ;  his 
waistcoat,  his  breeches,  and  I  know  not  what 
formless  rags,  formed  his  coverlet.  Never  in  all 
my  life  had  I  encountered  such  misery.  Amid 
all  these  hideous  surroundings,  the  child  beamed 
with  resignation  and  innocence.  Nothing  was 
white  save  his  face  and  the  surplice  of  the 
priest ;  everything  else  appeared  tawny  or  livid 
in  that  hut,  where  the  timid  light  of  the  torch 
was  overpowered  by  palpable  shadows.  And 
I  bent  my  knee  ;  then,  rising,  I  poured  forth 
the  words  of  absolution  upon  the  gentle  patient ; 
then  approaching,  and  bending  down,  I  laid 
upon  his  lips,  already  growing  cold,  the  God  of 
all  consolation.  At  that  moment,  the  clank  of 
chains  resounded,  and  the  head  of  an  animal 
emerged  from  an  opening  in  the  wall  near  the 
pallet,  then   another  quite   different   head.  .  .  . 


THE   COUNTRY,    THE  PEASANT.  1 67 

It  was  a  cow  and  an  ass,  who  stretched  out 
their  necks  lovingly  towards  the  bed,  to  the 
barely  covered  feet  of  him  who  had  formerly 
led  them  to  pasture  ;  and  this  sight  suddenly 
made  me  shiver,  and  the  tears  rose  to  my  eyes ; 
and,  as  Christmas  was  at  hand,  I  thought  I  had 
been  transported  to  Bethlehem,  during  that 
great  night :  all  was  there,  —  the  stable,  the 
manger,  the  infant  Jesus,  for  the  poor  are  all 
Jesuses ;  that  woman,  his  mother,  represented 
the  Divine  Mother ;  those  men,  Saint  Joseph  ; 
the  shepherds,  the  magi ;  those  two  humble 
beasts  the  ass  and  the  ox ;  that  light,  the  mirac- 
ulous star ;  I,  the  minister  of  salutation,  the 
Angel  sent  to  announce  the  great  joy.  .  .  . 

As  he  breathed  his  last  sigh,  I  exclaimed, 
11  God  descended  from  heaven  into  a  manger, 
do  thou,  child,  mount  from  this  manger  into 
heaven !  .  .  ."  'Tis  a  memory  which  cannot  be 
forgotten ! 


IX. 
LOVE,   FRIENDSHIP,   FRIENDS. 


i. 
To  love  is  to  choose. 

ii. 

Friends  are  rare,  for  the  good  reason  that 
men  are  not  common. 

in. 

The  vital  air  of  friendship  is  composed  of 
confidence.  Friendship  perishes  in  proportion 
as  this  air  diminishes. 

IV. 

We  distrust  our  heart  too  much,  and  our  head 
not  enough. 

v. 

"  Let  us  love  each  other.  .  .  ."  For  our 
neighbor's  sake  ?  He  is  so  unlovable !  For 
our  own  sake  ?  We  are  so  unloving  !  For  the 
sake  of  God,  the  only  lovable,  the  only  loving. 


LOVE,  FRIENDSHIP,  FRIENDS.  1 69 


VI. 

All  human  affection  soon  crumbles,  if  God, 
invoked  as  the  cause,  as  the  reason,  as  the  end, 
does  not  strengthen  and  consecrate  it. 

VII. 

Is  to  love  ourself  only  to  love  ? 

VIII. 

What  we  love  in  others  is,  our  ideas,  our 
tastes,  our  opinions.  ...  —  And  our  talents  ?  .  .  . 
—  Not  at  all. 

IX. 

The  way  Pamphilius  receives  me  is  to  extend 
his  arms  to  me  from  afar,  to  throw  himself  upon 
my  neck,  to  embrace  me,  to  raise  me  up,  to 
bruise  me  with  kisses,  to  seize  my  hands,  to 
twist  them,  to  shake  them,  and,  gazing  at  me 
with  exaltation,  to  ask  all  in  a  breath,  and  with- 
out waiting  for  a  reply,  about  my  health,  my 
studies,  my  affairs,  my  parents,  my  acquain- 
tances ;  to  call  me  at  every  phrase,  "  My  dear 
fellow  !  my  dearest  fellow  !  " 

"  Oh,  large-hearted  man  !  rare  friend  I n  ... 
I  say  to  myself.  And  while  rearranging  my 
hair  and  wiping  my  face,  I  rack  my  brain  for 
some  response  to  such  an  effusion  of  tenderness. 
I  turn  round,  I  open  my  mouth.  .  .  .     Where  is 


\JQ  THOUGHTS. 

Pamphilius  ?  Pamphilius  has  disappeared  !  Be- 
hold him  yonder  in  the  distance,  lifting  up,  and 
nearly  suffocating  in  his  arms,  Gordian,  whom 
he  hardly  knows,  and  who  repeats,  "  Oh,  large- 
hearted  man !  .  .  ." 

x. 
A  face  which  is  always  serene  possesses  a 
mysterious  and  powerful  attraction  :  sad  hearts 
come  to  it,  as  to  the  sun,  to  warm  themselves 
again. 

XI. 

The  egoist  does  not  tolerate  egoism. 

XII. 

I  do  not  always  admire  what  I  love,  neither 
do  I  always  love  what  I  admire. 

XIII. 

Have  friends,  not  for  the  sake  of  receiving, 
but  of  giving. 

XIV. 

Commonplace  consolations  are  harsh  for  deli- 
cate sorrows. 

xv. 

Arcan  draws  me  aside,  and  confides  to  me, 
with  numberless  precautions  and  endless  exhor- 
tations, a  trifling  secret :  "  Be  careful,  at  least ! 
do  not  tell  it,  please,  to  a  living  soul !  ...  if  you 
were  to  compromise  me !  .  .  ."     I  reassure  him. 


LOVE,  FRIENDSHIP,  FRIENDS.  171 

Nevertheless,  this  fine  secret  has  made  the 
tour  of  the  town  in  two  days. 

So  some  one  has  betrayed  Arcan  ?  —  No 
doubt. — Who  is  it  ?  —  Himself.  .  .  .  Every  one 
is  his  intimate  friend,  and  he  opens  his  heart 
equally  to  all. 

XVI. 

Your  friend  returns  from  a  long  journey.  .  .  . 
Shall  you  confide  in  him  at  once  ?  This  is  hardly 
prudent.  What  if  he  has  changed  ?  .  .  .  Then 
feel  him  near  his  heart,  for  an  instant,  at  least. 

XVII. 

The  man  of  genius  and  the  man  of  heart  vie 
with  each  other  in  saying,  "  Understand  me  and 
you  will  love  me.  ..."  —  "  Love  me  and  you 
will  understand  me!" 

XVIII. 

When  we  are  loved  by  one  person,  or  more, 
than  one,  we  become  so  accustomed  to  this 
sweet  sensation,  that  we  are  tempted  to  cry 
out  about  injustice  when  we  stumble  against 
an  enemy,  or,  I  should  say,  an  indifferent 
person,  outside. 

XIX. 

I  love  enthusiasts  ;  exalted  people  frighten 
me. 


172  THOUGHTS. 


XX. 


DilectiOt  diligentia :  a   relationship  of  words 
which  should  be  a  relationship  of  things. 

Is  "love"  which  is  inactive,  sincere  "love"? 


XXI. 


Here  are  two  strange  loves,  —  our  love  for  our- 
selves who  are  so  miserable,  and  our  love  for 
this  life  which  is  so  full  of  woes. 


XXII. 


A  certain  sort  of  evil-speaking  proceeds  from 
love. 

XXIII. 

How  many  love  God  so  intensely,  so  intensely 
that  they  cannot  love  their  neighbor  by  reason 
of  it. 

XXIV. 

Friendship  admits  of  difference  of  character, 
as  love  does  that  of  sex. 

xxv. 

As  long  as  we  love,  we  lend  to  the  beloved 
object  qualities  of  mind  and  heart  which  we 
deprive  him  of  when  the  day  of  misunderstand- 
ing: arrives. 


LOVE,  FRIENDSHIP,  FRIENDS.  173 

XXVI. 

To  imagine  that  we  know  love,  when  it  is  not 
God  whom  we  love,  is  to  take  this  little  pool  of 
muddy  water  for  the  great  sea  with  its  azure 
waves. 

XXVII. 

Sphinx  draws  me  aside  and  says  to  me  with 
quite  an  interesting  air:  "There  are  three  or 
four  of  us  who  propose  to  recommend  you  to  the 
master.  It  is  really  a  shame  that  a  man  like  you 
should  remain  thus  in  obscurity.  Yet  we  have 
feared  to  take  too  much  upon  ourselves  ;  and  I 
wish,  before  going  further,  to  inform  you  of  it, 
and  to  ask  your  opinion."  —  What  need  have 
you  of  my  authority,  Sphinx,  to  speak  well  of 
me  ?  If  you  had  served  me  without  my  knowl- 
edge, how  much  more  merit  you  would  have 
had,  how  much  glory  I  ?  I  understand  :  you 
take  advantage  of  having  wished  it,  as  though 
you  had  said  :  "  We  propose,  you  say,  to  oblige 
you  .  .  .  "  —  "And  I,  Sphinx,  propose  to  say, 
thank  you,  for  it." 

XXVIII. 

God  alone  can  properly  bind  up  a  bleeding 
heart. 

XXIX. 

Stomachs  which  have  long  been  deprived  of- 
nourishment,  weaken  and  succumb :  thus  hearts 


174  THOUGHTS. 

long  tried,  resist  a  happiness  which  is  late  in 
coming. 

XXX. 

Let  us  carry  our  heart  through  life  as  we 
would  carry  a  torch,  with  our  hand  about  it, 
lest  the  wind  should  extinguish  it. 

XXXI. 

What  is  love  ?  two  souls  and  one  flesh ; 
friendship  ?  two  bodies  and  one  soul. 

XXXII. 

We  vaunt  our  friend  as  a  man  of  talent,  less 
because  he  has  talent  than  because  he  is  our 
friend. 

XXXIII. 

We  always  distrust  too  much  or  too  little. 

xxxiv. 

"  Necessarius,"  the  friend,  the  man  who  is 
necessary.  ...  A  deep  word,  an  ingenius  word, 
a  touching  word.     When  will  it  be  French  ? 

XXXV. 

Friendship  is  the  ideal ;  friends  are  the  real- 
ity; reality  always  remains  far  apart  from  the 
ideal. 


LOVE,  FRIENDSHIP,  FRIENDS.  l?$ 


XXXVI. 


The  man  abandoned  by  his  friends,  one  after 
another,  without  just  cause,  will  acquire  the 
reputation  of  being  hard  to  please,  changeable, 
ungrateful,  unsociable. 


XXXVII. 


Our  friend,  on  the  day  of  rupture,  forges  for 
himself  a  weapon  against  us  from  the  fact 
that  we  are  on  bad  terms  with  some  one  else, 
whether  justly  or  not. 

XXXVIII. 

Let  us  be  proud  of  a  friendship  without  ever 
being  vain  of  it. 

xxxix. 

One  feels  tempted  to  say  to  certain  persons, 
"If  you  deceive  me,  I  will  never  again  trust 
anyone." 

XL. 

However  well  proved  a  friendship  may  ap- 
pear, there  are  confidences  which  it  should  not 
hear,  and  sacrifices  which  should  not  be  required 
of  it. 

XLI. 

Not  all  of  those  to  whom  we  do  good  love 
us,  neither  do  all  those  to  whom  we  do  evil 
hate  us. 


176  THOUGHTS. 

XLII. 

The  tenderness  of  some  people  is  a  torrent. 
On  certain  days  it  is  over  abundant,  and  it 
overflows  ;  and  then,  what  a  drought ! 

XLIII. 

Interest,  ambition,  fortune,  time,  temper,  love, 
all  kill  friendship. 

XLIV. 

Cerberon  and  Pectorin  fill,  the  one  here,  the 
other  there,  an  inferior  position  all  beset  with 
irritating  difficulties.  The  same  trouble  isolates 
them  from  the  world,  and  draws  them  together. 
As  each  needs  a  confidant,  they  complain  to- 
gether, —  Pectorin,  who  is  gentle,  sadly ;  Cerbe- 
ron, the  proud  Cerberon,  with  bitterness ;  and 
some  consolation  visits  them,  at  least  while  thus 
communicating  their  vexation  to  each  other. 

Cerberon,  more  fortunate  than  Pectorin,  be- 
comes his  own  master  while  still  young.  Behold 
him,  then,  his  own  master  and,  what  is  more, 
master  of  no  one  knows  what  poor  fellow  who 
displeases  him  at  first  sight,  and  of  whom  he 
complains  in  a  letter  to  Pectorin.  "What  if  you 
were  to  claim  me  for  your  own  ? "  they  write  to 
each  other.  This  idea  flatters  them.  Neither 
of  them  will  rest  until  it  is  realized. 

Victory !    Behold  them  together,  these  good 


LOVE,   FRIENDSHIP,  FRIENDS,  IJJ 

old  friends,  these  ancient  neighbors  of  the 
galleys!  Oh,  what  joyous  bursts  of  laughter! 
Oh,  what  embraces  !  Oh,  what  promises  to  be 
happy  with  each  other,  through  each  other !  .  .  . 

Long  dinners,  frequent  walks,  interminable 
tete-a-tete,  games,  music,  reading,  gossip  about 
Peter  and  about  Paul  .  .  .  that  will  last  at  least 
a  week. 

Cerberon,  having  exhausted  his  enthusiasm, 
makes  haste  to  exhibit  his  irascible,  peevish, 
arrogant  character.  The  friend  departs,  the 
master  remains.  Who  is  surprised  ?  Pectorin  ; 
Pectorin  henceforth  condemned  to  suffer  doubly ; 
for  he  who  formerly  comforted  him  is  now  the 
man  who  wounds  him. 

XLV. 

Many,  not  being  able  to  do  without  love,  love 
at  random.  These  wear  out  their  people  rapidly ; 
a  new  friend  each  month  would  not  be  too  much 
for  them.  At  first  all  is  flame.  They  unbosom 
themselves  as  much  as  they  are  capable  of 
doing.  This  effusion  once  over,  they  yawn, 
complain,  get  angry,  and  depart. 

XLVI. 

Since  in  possessing  you,  we  possess  all  if  we 
had  nothing  else,  and  in  not  possessing  you  we 
have  nothing  if  we  had  all  the  rest,  oh,  my 


178  THOUGHTS. 

God,  I  will  love  you  that  I  may  possess  you 
upon  earth ;  and  I  will  possess  you  that  I 
may  love  you  one  day  in  heaven. 

XLVII. 

Neither  frivolous  enough  to  have  comrades, 
nor  credulous  enough  to  have  friends. 

XLVIII. 

Eubalus,  in  his  youth,  pierced  both  friends 
and  foes  with  his  arrows.  A  reputation  for  a 
malicious  tongue  is  the  price  of  his  long  toil. 
Every  one  fears  him.  In  other  days  he  found 
an  advantage  in  it,  now  he  reproaches  himself 
for  it.  In  order  to  win  his  way  back  into  favor, 
he  distributes  right  and  left  many  a  compliment, 
many  a  smile.  What  success  responds  to  his 
efforts  ?  People  end  by  not  fearing  him,  and 
begin  to  despise  him. 

XLIX. 

Encomius  addresses  a  word  of  praise  to  me. 
He  knows  well  that  I  do  not  deserve  it.  I  know 
it  also.  Nevertheless,  I  do  not  fail  to  smile 
with  gratitude  upon  him.  .  .  .  Oh,  the  strength 
of  flattery  !    Oh,  the  feebleness  of  man  ! 

L. 

Love,  almost  everything  in  romances,  is 
almost  nothing  in  life. 


LOVE,  FRIENDSHIP,   FRIENDS.  1 79 


LI. 

There  are  people  who  laugh  to  show  their 
fine  teeth ;  and  there  are  those  who  cry  to  show 
their  good  hearts. 

LII. 

Souls  naturally  generous,  but  chilled  by  expe- 
rience, resemble  brooks  covered  with  ice,  which 
are  full  beneath  of  beautiful  movements  and 
sweet  murmurs. 

Lin. 

Trees  which  the  cold  has  touched  do  not 
perish  at  once.  Spring  visits  them  again  with 
a  remnant  of  sap,  and  decks  them  over  again 
with  a  little  foliage ;  then  they  die.  .  .  .  Thus 
it  is  with  hearts  which,  deeply  wounded,  love, 
speak,  smile  for  a  space  ere  they  die. 

LIV. 

We  call  that  person  who  has  lost  his  father, 
an  orphan ;  and  a  widower,  that  man  who  has 
lost  his  wife.  .  .  .  And  that  man  who  has 
known  the  immense  unhappiness  of  losing 
his  friend,  by  what  name  do  we  call  him  ?  .  .  . 
Here  every  human  language  holds  its  peace 
in  impotence. 


180  THOUGHTS. 


LV. 


King,  priest,  poet,  call  each  other  thou !    Call 
each  other  thou,  ye  wearers  of  crowns ! 


LVI. 


Every  large  family  has   its   angel    and    its 
demon. 


X.    . 

GOD,    RELIGION. 


Scitolus  has  studied  everything  ;  he  remem- 
bers everything  ;  he  has  all  the  dynasties  of  the 
Pharaohs  at  the  tips  of  his  fingers,  all  the  incarna- 
tions of  Vishnu,  all  the  migrations  of  the  Aryans  ; 
ask  him  about  the  colonies  of  Gaul,  the  divinities 
of  Carthage,  of  Athens,  and  of  Rome,  the  name, 
the  age,  the  country  of  the'  Sibyls,  the  titles, 
subjects,  personages,  the  authors  of  the  pieces  of 
the  Greek  theatre,  he  will  answer  all  without  an 
error.  The  pearl  which  Cleopatra  dissolved 
in  Cyprus  wine,  or  the  fish  which  Domitian 
put  to  the  vote  of  the  senate  ?  "  Questions 
for  a  schoolboy ! "  he  will  say,  shrugging 
his  shoulders.  "  Have  you  nothing  to  ask 
me  but  that  trifle  ? "  Thus  it  is  an  estab- 
lished truth,  an  understood  thing,  an  attested 
fact,  that  Scitolus  is  ignorant  of  nothing.  Thus 
it  is  imputed  to  disdain,  if  not  to  modesty,  that 
when  he  held  his  sister's  child  at  the  bap- 
tismal  font   the  other   day,   he   could   neither 


1 82  THOUGHTS. 

finish   the    "  Our  Father,"    nor  commence  "  I 
believe  in  God  !  " 

ii. 

The  modern  nations  are  ant-heaps  in  constant 
agitation.  All  within  them  is  movement,  dis- 
order, dissension.  .  .  .  What  is  the  end  of  all 
these  labors  without  or  against  God  ?  Sooner 
or  later  God  will  rise,  and  with  his  foot  he  will 
scatter  the  fabric  of  madness. 

in. 

With  the  Hebrews,  a  single  term  expressed 
these  two  different  things  :  To  pledge  one's 
word  ;  To  tell  a  lie. 

The  French  form  of  speech,  To  take  an  oath, 
is  tending  day  by  day  towards  this  double 
meaning. 

IV. 

One  ray  of  sunlight  contributes  more  to  the 
welfare  of  our  poor  people  than  all  the  dreams 
of  our  economists. 


Greek  and  Latin  have  a  word  to  designate 
an  individual  of  the  human  species  ;  they  say, 
avOpwiro*;,  homo.  These  two  languages  have, 
moreover,  a  special  word  to  express  the  cour- 
ageous man  :  avrjp,  vir.  Who  knows  why  such 
a  term  is  lacking  in  French  ? 


GOD,  RELIGION.  183 


VI. 


Egoism  willingly  generalizes  :  if  anything 
suits  him,  everything  is  going  well  ;  if  any- 
thing does  not  suit  him,  everything  is  going  ill. 

VII. 

The  sun  drinks  in  the  drop  of  dew  which  casts 
back  its  rays,  and  God  absorbs  the  soul  which 
reflects  him. 

VIII. 

O  thou  who  art  calumniated,  have  patience ! 
God  knows.  Thou  who  art  misunderstood,  be 
resigned  !  God  sees.  Thou  who  art  forgotten, 
have  hope  !  God  remembers. 

IX. 

Everything  is  against  us,  even  ourselves ; 
God  alone  loves  us  well ;  'tis  he  alone  whom  we 
repulse. 

x. 

Impious  men  deny  God  at  first  through 
boastfulness,  and  afterwards  through  false 
shame. 

XI. 

If  we  only  understood  thoroughly  that  the 
good  God  loves  us  more  than  we  love  him,  more 
than  we  love  ourselves  ! 


1 84  THOUGHTS. 

XII. 

Jesus  Christ,  says  Saint  Augustine,  never 
performed  a  miracle  for  the  sake  of  performing 
a  miracle ;  and  you,  ye  artists,  imitators  of  God, 
you  claim  to  paint  for  the  sake  of  painting,  to 
sing  for  the  sake  of  singing,  to  write  for  the 
sake  of  writing.  .  .  . 

XIII. 

Morality  is  the  fruit  of  religion  :  to  desire  the 
former  without  the  latter,  is  to  desire  an  orange 
without  an  orange-tree. 

XIV. 

Man  is  naturally  pious  ;  he  is  virtuous  only 
supernaturally. 

xv. 

Two  sorts  of  men  despise  public  opinion, — 
sinners  and  saints. 

XVI. 

Let  us  love  God,  not  as  much  because  he 
deserves  —  that  we  cannot  do;  but  as  much 
as  we  can  —  that  he  deserves. 

XVII. 

Catholicism  is  alone  sincerely  "human,"  be- 
cause it  alone  is  truly  "  divine." 


GOD,  RELIGION.  185 

XVIII. 

"  Love  only  me  and  others  for  my  sake  ! " 
Admirable  precept,  absolute,  yet  just,  urgent, 
yet  tender ! 

Ah !  if  we  loved  God,  this  demand  for  love 
would  not  trouble  us  ingrates,  would  not  incom- 
mode us,  unbelievers  that  we  are  ! 

XIX. 

When  Louis  XV.  was  ill  at  Metz,  and  began 
to  convalesce,  the  populace,  whom  fear  of  losing 
their  king  had  plunged  in  anguish  which  was 
worse  than  mourning,  abandoned  themselves  to 
transports  of  wild  joy  on  learning  of  his  recovery. 
It  is  said  that  the  king  exclaimed,  "  What  have 
I  done  to  them  !  " 

Thus  God,  who  grieves  when  man  is  ill  with 
sin,  rejoices  when  he  sees  him  regain  life.  And 
man  asks,  "  What  have  I  done  to  God  ? " 
What  have  you  done  to  him,  O  man  ?  To  him 
who  loves  you  and  thought  he  had  lost  you !  .  .  . 

XX. 

In  the  presence  of  God  we  speak  too  much ; 
we  do  not  listen  enough.  Let  us  allow  the 
Master  to  speak.  This  is  just ;  it  will  be  profit- 
able. Indeed,  he  knows  what  we  know,  and  we 
do  not  know  what  he  knows. 


1 86  THOUGHTS. 

XXI. 

Everything  contends  with  God  for  us. 

XXII. 

Belief  in  one's  self  conquers  the  world ;  belief 
in  God  conquers  heaven. 

XXIII. 

God  endures  us  when  we  offend  him ;  let  us 
endure  him  when  he  tries  us ;  endurance  is  one 
of  the  names  of  love. 

XXIV. 

Christian,  philanthropist  humanitarian.  .  .  . 
Humanitarian,  philanthropist,  Christian. 

xxv. 

The  good  God  is  not  proud.  When  the 
world  will  have  none  or  will  have  no  more  of  a 
beauty,  of  a  glory,  of  a  grandeur,  of  a  soul,  he 
claims  it  and  takes  it. 

xxvi. 

O  priest,  think  not  that  when,  at  the  foot 
of  the  altar,  before  the  assembled  church,  you 
renounced  the  world,  the  flesh  and  blood,  you 
uttered  a  vain  formula.  The  people,  jealous 
witnesses,  understood  naught  of  the  Latin  sylla- 


GOD,  RELIGION.  1 87 

bles,  but  they  understood  perfectly  what  they 
saw  done  ;  and  woe  to  you,  if  you  should  chance 
—  which  God  forbid  !  to  forget  your  vow ;  they 
will  force  you  to  remember  it,  these  people, 
however  impious  they  may  have  become,  and 
will  recall  you  in  rude  fashion  to  your  duty. 

XXVII. 

The  true,  the  good,  the  beautiful.  A  thou- 
sand times  have  I  tried  to  define  this  triple 
radiance  of  a  glorious  mystery.  Vain  effort ! 
Who  is  powerless  ?  The  word  ?  the  mind  ?  the 
man  ?   myself  ?  .  .  . 

XXVIII. 

St.  Thomas  d' Aquinas  verifies  as  though  he 
could  not  believe,  and  believes  as  though  he 
ought  not  to  verify. 

XXIX. 

Contemporary  science  is  laborious,  skilful, 
mighty  .  .  .  and  blind.  Yes,  blind.  Theology 
is  the  eye  which  it  lacks. 

XXX. 

The  believer  and  the  unbeliever  vie  in  saying, 
"  Liberty !  "  But  the  one  wishes  to  be  free  in 
order  that  he  may  make  himself  the  slave  of  all ; 
the  other,  in  order  that  he  may  make  all  his 
slaves. 


1 88  THOUGHTS. 


XXXI. 


In  our  trials  we  run  to  God,  and  we  do  well. 
Only  we  are  wrong  in  believing  that  God,  be- 
cause he  is  God,  will  infallibly  grant  prayer 
which  we  address  to  him,  because  we  address  a 
prayer  to  him.  If  the  effect  does  not  meet  our 
expectations,  we  are  scandalized  ;  we  doubt  God 
and  his  Providence.  .  .  .  Suppliants  should 
show  more  confidence,  more  resignation,  and 
not  "enjoin"  God  to  deliver  them  from  their 
trouble,  thus  placing  before  him  the  alternative 
of  either  doing  our  will  or  of  forfeiting  our 
good  graces. 

XXXII. 

Let  us  lavish  ourselves  upon  God  alone. 

XXXIII. 

Love  everybody  for  God,  and  few  for  thyself. 

XXXIV. 

All  is  open,  all  is  in  the  air  (letter  to  the 
French  Academy).  Who  speaks  thus  of  the 
Gothic  cathedral  ?  F^nelon  ;  F^nelon  who  has 
become  an  ancient  through  a  pagan-classic  edu- 
cation, to  the  point  of  neither  feeling  nor  think- 
ing as  a  Christian,  a  priest,  an  artist. 

All  is  in  the  air!  Eh!  yes;  the  Christian 
also  is  "  in  the  air,"  and  his  soul  losing  beneath 


GOD,  RELIGION.  1 89 

the  evangelical  chisel  its  native  heaviness,  has 
quitted  the  earth  to  suspend  itself  and  gleam 
resplendent  in  heaven. 

xxxv. 

An  inscription  has  been  found,  a  strange, 
mysterious  inscription  ;  some  learned  man  halts, 
bends  down,  turns  the  enigma,  and  turns  again ; 
and  the  enigma  rolls  itself  into  a  ball  of  spines 
like  the  hedgehog,  and  becomes  the  more  inex- 
orable, the  more  it  is  shaken  and  interrogated, 
which  exasperates  our  learned  man,  who  is  re- 
duced to  exclaiming  :  "  Oh,  the  foolish  thing ! 
oh,  the  vain  caprice  !  oh,  the  gross  carelessness  ! 
oh,  barbarous  age  !  ..."  And  the  Sphinx  cries 
to  himself,  "  Barbarus  his  ego  sum,  quia  non  in- 
telligor  Mis  "  (I  am  barbarous  to  them  because 
I  am  not  understood  of  them). 

xxxvi. 

So  long  as  philosophy  neglects  to  teach  belief, 
love,  prayer,  it  will  be  condemned  to  be  only  an 
ornamental  science. 

XXXVII. 

What  is  the  present  philosophy?  An  exer- 
cise of  declamation  for  the  use  of  schools,  rather 
than  a  rule  of  conduct  which  is  useful  for  life. 


I90  THOUGHTS. 

XXXVIII. 

The  philosophy  of  the  colleges  is  unsolid  food, 
which  loads  the  stomach  without  nourishing  the 
body. 

xxxix. 

Whence  come  we  ?  What  are  we  ?  Whither 
are  we  going  ?  All  questions  which  perplex  the 
human  reason,  which  divine  wisdom  alone  can 
solve. 

XL. 

The  incessant  calling  into  question  of  that 
which  is  already  solved,  or  of  that  which  is 
evidently  not  to  be  solved,  constitutes  the  vain 
extravagance  which  people  dare  to  decorate  with 
the  name  of  philosophy. 

XLI. 

A  proof  that  human  reason  alone  would  not 
have  discovered  supernatural  truths  is  found 
in  the  fact  that  they  do  not  yet  exist  for  its 
followers. 

XLII. 

Many  philosophers  imitate  the  maniac  who 
closed  the  shutters  of  his  chamber  in  broad  day- 
light, in  order  to  write  by  candle-light.  The 
candle  is  the  wisdom  of  the  ancients  ;  the  full 
daylight  is  the  eternal  wisdom  manifested  in 
the  Gospel. 


GOD,  RELIGION.  191 


XLIII. 

If  the  son  of  Mary  is  nothing  but  a  great 
philosopher,  whence  comes  it,  O,  ye  free- 
thinkers, that  you  love  so  little  and  profess  so 
badly  his  philosophy  ? 

XLIV. 

They  do  nothing  but  affirm,  on  the  one  hand, 
the  eternity  of  Matter,  and  on  the  other  dispute 
the  eternity  of  Life  .  .  .  Oh,  contradiction  !  oh, 
calamity ! 

XLV. 

"The  soul,"  says  the  Council  of  Trent,  "is 
the  substantial  form  of  the  body."  Admirable 
definition,  unknown  to  the  ancient  philosophers, 
disregarded  by  the  modern  philosophers,  and 
which  sets  forth  in  the  light,  without  withdraw- 
ing it  from  its  profundity,  that  great  question  of 
the  Homo  duplex. 

XLVI. 

Who  is  there  that  does  not  love  the  truth  .  .  . 
speculatively  ? 

XLVII. 

The  prejudices  of  the  schools  are  obstinate. 
Let  those  refuse  to  free  themselves  from  them 
who  will.  How  many  people  who  believe  them- 
selves to  be  grounded  in  reason,  and  are  only 
grounded  in  routine,  bear  them  about  for  a  long, 


192  THOUGHTS. 

long  time,  without  being  able  to  quit  them, 
like  those  boys  who  still  wear  petticoats  at  an 
advanced  age. 

XLVIII. 

Certain  logicians  never  give  but  one  reason, 
—  the  best  one,  I  suppose.  Others  begin  by- 
enumerating  all  the  reasons ;  then  they  say, 
"  This  is  peremptory ;  that  is  open  to  dis- 
pute. .  .  ."  Such  tilters  never  fail  to  provoke 
both  adversaries  and  spectators ;  I  admit  it ; 
nevertheless,  one  must  know  how  to  wait  upon 
their  pleasure,  and  not  to  beat  them  harshly 
from  the  very  threshold  of  their  argument. 

XLIX. 

The  same  arguments  which  we  deem  forcible 
as  applied  to  others,  seem  feeble  to  us  when 
turned  against  ourselves. 

L. 

The  incredulous  cease  not  to  clamor:  "Oh, 
the  disinterestedness  of  Crates !  oh,  the  re- 
nunciation of  Diogenes  !  oh,  the  austerity  of 
Pythagoras  and  Epictetus !  oh,  the  goodness  of 
Marcus  Aurelius  !  .  .  ."  On  the  other  hand,  the 
humble  and  daily  practice  of  all  these  virtues, 
and  of  others  besides,  renders  them  indignant, 
even  horrifies  them. 


GOD,   RELIGION.  193 

LI. 

To  hope  to  grasp  such  or  such  a  truth  by  dint 
of  abstraction,  is  to  wish  to  lay  hold  of  the 
sun  or  the  moon  by  leaping :  one  quickly  falls 
back. 

LII. 

Analysis,  synthesis,  reasoning,  abstraction, 
and  experience,  wishing  to  take  counsel  to- 
gether, begin  by  banishing  sentiment,  which 
carries  away  the  light  when  it  departs,  and 
leaves  them  in  darkness. 

LIII. 

Many  metaphysicians  recall  Don  Quixote 
mounted  upon  Clavifer ;  they  shake  about,  rise 
in  their  stirrups,  and  spur  forward  with  might 
and  main,  crying,  "Come  on!"  The  heat  which 
they  arouse  in  themselves,  and  in  those  about 
them,  seems  to  them  the  atmosphere  of  the 
upper  regions  :  "  The  infinite  !  the  infinite ! " 
In  truth,  they  have  not  quitted  the  earth. 

LIV. 

The  effort  of  human  reason  succeeded  in  dis- 
covering God,  though  very  imperfectly.  What 
remained  was  to  serve  God,  to  love  God.  Phi- 
losophy did  not  discover  this,  or  the  discovery 
amounted  to  nothing. 


194  THOUGHTS. 

LV. 

Anathema  upon  those  rash  beings  who,  under 
the  pretext  of  desiring  simply  to  know  and  to 
sound  the  depths,  go  straight  to  the  roots,  lay 
them  bare,  detach  them,  starve  them  so  that 
the  tree,  with  sap  exhausted  and  strength  con- 
sumed, falls  at  last,  and  with  its  dead  boughs 
crushes  the  generations  which  are  reposing 
beneath  its  shadow. 

LVI. 

"  Man,  depraved  by  pride,  is  so  strangely  his 
own  enemy,  that  he  conceives  a  hatred  for  the 
only  doctrine  which  gives  value  to  his  exist- 
ence ;  he  would  regard  it  as  a  triumph  to  estab- 
lish upon  the  ruins  of  that  celestial  doctrine 
errors  equally  absurd  and  disheartening,  and 
would  taste,  I  know  not  what  desperate  joy,  in 
insuring  for  himself,  even  at  the  expense  of  his 
reason,  a  wretchedness  without  remedy  and 
without  end.  .  .  ."  (Lamennais,  Essay  on  In- 
difference  in  the  Matter  of  Religion,  Pagnerre's 
edition,  Vol.  I.  Part  II.  Chap,  n.) 

Lamennais  himself  was  surely  that  man  "de- 
praved by  pride,  so  strangely  an  enemy  to  him- 
self," who  "conceived  a  hatred  for  the  only 
Catholic  doctrine  which  gave  value  to  his  exist- 
ence" as  a  priest  and  an  apologist.     He  "re- 


GOD,   RELIGION.  1 95 

garded  it  as  a  triumph  to  establish  upon  the 
ruins  of  that  celestial  doctrine"  of  humility  be- 
fore God  and  obedience  to  the  Church  "  errors 
equally  absurd  and  disheartening,"  and  "tasted," 
without  even  being  able  to  say,  "  I  do  not  know," 
a  desperate  joy  in  assuring  for  himself,  even  at 
the  expense  of  his  reason,  alas  !  "  a  wretched- 
ness without  remedy"  here  below,  and  "with- 
out end  "  elsewhere. 

By  dint  of  dissecting  that  rotten  body  of 
philosophy  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  unfor- 
tunate anatomist  has  caught  the  poison  from 
the  corpse,  like  those  practitioners  who  owe 
their  death  to  imprudent  autopsies. 

LVII. 

The  Middle  Ages  "  ratiocinated  "  about  every- 
thing and  everywhere ;  the  new  times  fall  into 
the  opposite  excess. 

LVIII. 

We  do  wrong  to  be  proud,  O  my  contempo- 
raries !  What  do  we  possess  ?  Fragments  of 
doctrine,  tatters  of  science.  The  men  of  the 
Middle  Ages  teach  us  too  many  things  to  per- 
mit of  our  imagining  that  we  know  much. 

LIX. 

What  do  you  mean  by  your  God  ?  "  Chance," 
that  "being  of  reason"  who  has  neither  being 
nor  reason  ? 


I96  THOUGHTS. 

LX. 

To  know  one's  self  is  the  true ;  to  strive  with 
one's  self  is  the  good ;  to  conquer  one's  self  is 
the  beautiful. 

LXI. 

"Methodical  doubt,"  which  was  inoffensive  in 
the  hands  of  the  reverent  Descartes,  becomes 
a  dangerous  weapon  when  it  passes  to  his  disci- 
ples. Descartes  exempted  the  truths  of  faith ; 
he  was  reminded  of  it.  By  dint  of  exaggerating, 
of  misconstruing  the  system  of  their  master, 
that  which  should  serve  the  truth  brought  profit 
only  to  error.  Methodical  doubt  changed  into 
systematic  doubt,  into  radical  doubt ;  the  means 
became  the  end,  the  way  became  the  goal,  and 
faith  perished  in  many  souls. 

LXII. 

The  discovery  of  a  planet,  the  invention  of  a 
machine,  or  the  application  of  a  system,  etc.,  is 
proclaimed  with  trumpet  and  voice ;  but  the 
truths  which  are  diminishing,  the  morals  which 
are  vanishing,  religion  which  is  perishing,  no 
one,  no  one  thinks  of  them. 

LXIII. 

In  theology,  intuition  works  marvels.  While 
ordinary  intelligences  are  climbing  the  paths  of 


GOD,  RELIGION.  1 97 

the  holy  mountain  by  force  of  study,  the  choic- 
est minds  gain  its  summit  with  one  bound. 
They  do  not  learn  ;  they  understand.  Profound 
questions,  sublime  themes  inspire  them,  delight 
them.  They  have  the  instinct  of  the  divine. 
While  the  argument  is  going  on  in  the  dark, 
sudden  flashes  overflow  them.  What  matter 
words  and  formulas  ?  They  see,  they  possess, 
they  enjoy ! 

LXIV. 

A  poplar  leaf  hides  our  view  of  the  sun ;  the 
slight  substance  of  an  earthly  care  hides  from 
us  the  immense  and  radiant  God. 

LXV. 

God  often  visits  us,  but  most  of  the  time  we 
are  not  at  home. 

LXVI. 

Intuition  deceives  us  at  first ;  facts  belie  our 
ideas  as  if  at  will ;  experience  chastens  us  .  .  . 
and  amends  us.  Little  by  little  foreseeing  no 
longer  suffices  for  us ;  we  wish  to  see,  we  accus- 
tom ourselves  to  look  needfully.  Then  intuition 
and  observation,  blended  together,  form  as  ex- 
quisite wisdom. 

LXVII. 

We  are  full  of  prejudices  and  antipathies  with 
regard  to  God.     We  love  him  little  because  we 


198  THOUGHTS. 

know  him  badly,  and  we  know  him  badly  because 
we  love  him  little. 

LXVIII. 

Philosophers  call  God  "the  great  unknown." 
"  The  great  mis-known  "  would  be  more  correct. 

LXIX. 

Cicero  asserted  that  there  was  no  folly  which 
philosophers  had  not  uttered.  Suarez  struck 
out  "philosophers"  to  write  "theologians." 
Thus,  neither  philosophy,  the  profane  remedy, 
nor  theology,  the  sacred  remedy,  wholly  heal  the 
mind  of  man  which  is  tainted  by  original  sin. 

LXX. 

Error  is  contagious  by  nature.  ...  By  its 
nature  ?  No,  by  ours. 

LXXI. 

God  occupies  the  base  and  the  apex  of  Chris- 
tian morality  :  the  base  as  principle,  support,  and 
force ;  the  apex  as  direction,  goal,  and  reward. 

LXXII. 

When  one  fights  for  a  holy  cause,  victory  is 
glory  here  below ;  defeat  is  glory  on  high. 

LXXIII. 

The  women  of  Ionia,  on  the  point  of  giving 


GOD,  RELIGION.  1 99 

birth,  fixed  their  eyes  upon  some  beautiful 
statue,  or  upon  some  graceful  picture,  in  order 
that  the  child  might  come  into  the  world  more 
graceful  and  beautiful. 

Let  us,  Christians,  have  thus  before  our  eyes 
some  great  example,  in  order  that  we  may  be 
born  more  perfect  into  the  life  of  heaven. 

LXXIV. 

There  is  a  "  sense  "  of  the  True,  and  he  who 
possesses  it  has  the  stuff  for  a  philosopher ;  a 
"sense"  of  the  Beautiful,  and  he  who  possesses 
it  is  born  an  artist ;  a  "  sense  "  of  the  Good,  and 
he  who  possesses  it  has  the  vocation  of  a  saint. 

LXXV. 

The  same  word  in  Hebrew  designates  good 
and  beautiful.  This  word  dates  from  the  ter- 
restrial Paradise.  It  bears  witness  to  the  anti- 
quity of  the  language  in  which  it  occurs,  and 
may  serve  as  a  proof  to  those  who  assert  that 
Adam  spoke  Hebrew. 

Since  the  original  sin,  Beauty  and  Goodness 
have  ceased  to  be  one  and  the  same  thing.  That 
which  is  good  is  not  always  beautiful,  neither  is 
that  which  is  beautiful  always  good.  The  effort 
and  the  aim  of  Art  should  be  to  re-establish  its 
primitive  identity.  Ideal  creation,  like  the  di- 
vine  creation,   has   need   of    this   approbation. 


200  THOUGHTS. 

Viditque  Dens  cuncta  qiuz  fecerat,  et  erant  valde 
bona  (pulckra-bona). 

LXXVI. 

Incredulity  takes  its  rise  in  excess  of  vice 
rather  than  in  excess  of  ignorance. 

LXXVII. 

A  serpent,  intoxicated  with  pride,  was  wallow- 
ing voluptuously  in  his  bed  of  mire.  Suddenly 
an  eagle  darts  down  upon  him  and  bears  him  on 
high.  The  monster  resists,  coils  himself  about 
the  bird,  hisses  in  his  face,  pierces  him  with  his 
triple  dart. 

Yet  the  eagle  soars  on,  soars  ever,  with  bleed- 
ing heart  and  eye  serene,  bearing  the  cold  rep- 
tile, which  struggles,  filled  with  hatred,  amid 
space  and  light.  .  .  . 

This  eagle  is  the  Church,  the  Church  bearing 
to  heaven,  by  doctrine  and  example,  those  men 
of  sin  who,  in  recompense,  lavish  venomous 
insults  upon  her,  and  seek  to  stifle  her  in  their 
coils,  and  lacerate  her  sides  with  their  stings  ! 

LXXVIII. 

What  ancient  poet  was  not  a  priest  ?  What 
priest  of  old  was  not  a  poet  ? 

Poetry,  that  language  divine  descended  upon 
human  lips,  united  heaven  and  earth  as  well  as 


GOD,  RELIGION.  201 

religion.     The  poet  vied  with  the  priest  as  the 
interpreter  of  the  divinity.  .  .  . 

The  infant  Church  opened  its  mouth  in  har- 
monious wails.  A  whole  swarm  of  singing 
bees,  a  whole  chorus  of  poets  surrounded  its 
cradle.  There  were  but  few  bishops  and  monks 
who  did  not  pluck  the  cords  of  the  harp. 
Women  even  were  heard  to  sing  in  a  manner 
to  charm  the  nightingales,  to  equal  the  angels. 
Then  came  the  Renaissance  and  the  Revolu- 
tion. The  Renaissance  raised  anew  the  tem- 
ples of  the  gods,  the  Revolution  scattered  the 
churches  of  God.  The  infidel,  that  wolf,  saw 
Moeris,  and  Mceris  lost  his  voice ;  "  that  voice 
whose  science  includes  everything,"  and  the 
sanctuary  unlearned  the  art  of  exultation  and 
of  groans.  The  strict  liturgy  suffices  for  wor- 
ship. No  more  spontaneous,  personal,  living 
poetry.  Inspiration  holds  its  peace ;  tradition 
could  recall  itself  but  vaguely.  Poetry  quitted 
the  cloister ;  hymn,  drama,  winged  prose,  all 
flew  away  like  swallows  in  the  autumn.  The 
priest  no  longer  prayed  melodiously ;  the  art 
of  verse  became  a  profane  art ;  the  shew-bread 
yielded  its  place  to  lay-bread ;  the  minister 
of  God  no  longer  dared  to  say  God,  but  the 
gods  ;  people  became  accustomed  to  scan  Olym- 
pus, Tartarus,  etc.  Santeuil  and  Vaniere  found 
Jupiter  more  poetical  than  Jehovah-Jesus. 


202  THOUGHTS. 

Chateaubriand,  Montalembert,  Lamartine, 
Hugo,  despatched  these  cast-off  garments  to  the 
old-clothes  man.  Paganism  grew  musty  outside 
the  Church — what  am  I  saying?  —  outside  of  the 
Academy  itself,  in  spite  of  Leconte  de  Lisle,  and 
Arsene  Houssaye,  and  Theodore  de  Banville. 
Andr£  Chenier  was  afraid  of  being  buried  by  a 
priest ;  he  was  interred  by  the  executioner.  It 
was  a  lesson ;  many  understood  it.  The  base- 
ness of  the  literary  revolution  was  renounced 
equally  with  the  wildness  of  the  revolutionary 
literature. 

Silence  of  the  neo-pagan  poets,  whether  lay 
or  clerical. 

Yes,  indeed,  but  silence  also  of  the  pious 
poets,  above  all,  of  the  poet-priests!  What 
great  poet  is  a  priest  to-day  ?  or,  if  that  pleases 
better,  what  priest  of  to-day  is  a  great  poet  ?  I 
speak  of  France.  Spain,  which  had  Calderon, 
now  has  Verdaguer,  Verdaguer,  the  magnificent 
"  reviver  "  of  a  world  engulfed  in  the  billows  of 
the  ocean,  and  in  the  gloom  of  history ;  but  as 
for  thee,  where  is  thy  poet-priest,  O  France  ? 

Ah !  let  him  arise  at  last,  and  may  God  grant 
me  to  hail  him,  this  mortal  doubly  crowned ! 
His  it  is  to  begin,  to  pursue  and  to  accomplish 
the  worthy  homage  and  the  hymn  which  is  due, 
in  opposition  to  those  violent  persons  who  stand 
ready  to  cry,/'  Oh,  scandal!  "  and  to  those  pusil- 


GOD,  RELIGION.  203 

lanimous  ones  who  are  prepared  to  sigh,  "  Oh, 
madness !  .  .  ." 

LXXIX. 

The  best,  I  had  almost  said  the  only,  way  of 
being  virtuous,  since  the  Gospel  exists,  is  to 
follow  the  Gospel. 

LXXX. 

The  Holy  Scriptures  praise  the  dew  of  the 
morning  and  the  dew  of  the  evening ;  ros  matu- 
tinum,  ros  serotinum  ! 

Happy  is  he  who  possesses  the  gift  of  tears  ! 
when  young,  he  will  bear  flowers ;  when  old, 
fruit ! 

LXXXI. 

The  habit  of  prayer  communicates  a  pene- 
trating sweetness  to  the  glance,  the  voice,  the 
smile,  the  tears,  to  all  one  says,  or  does,  or 
writes.  .  .  . 

LXXXII. 

Ah  !  what  need  there  is  at  present  that  a  man 
should  rise  up  from  amongst  men ;  and,  pre- 
pared for  official  disgrace,  imprudent  in  the 
sight  of  the  age,  truly  wise  in  the  sight  of  God, 
should  cry,  his  breast  heaving  with  sobs,  that 
God  is  too  little  recognized,  conscience  too  often 
slain,  the  interest  and  honor  of  each  individual 
too  greatly  tried.  .  .  . 


204  THOUGHTS. 

Friends  and  enemies  would  probably  repeat, 
"  Tolle  !  to  lie  !  "  (away  with  him  !  away  with 
him !)  But,  on  the  other  hand,  how  faith, 
hope,  and  love  would  be  avenged  ! 

LXXXIII. 

I.  The  Grain  of  Wheat.  —  O  sower,  why 
dost  thou  forsake  me  ?  Escaped  from  the  hoar 
frosts  of  winter  and  the  storms  of  summer,  how 
greatly  did  I  suffer  when  thou  didst  pluck  me 
from  the  ripened  ear,  when  thou  didst  confine 
me  within  the  depths  of  the  dark  granary! 
Thou  lovest  me  then  no  longer  ?  Alas  !  I  had 
hoped  to  nourish  thee  one  day,  that  is,  to  be- 
come flesh  of  thy  body,  and  blood  of  thy  veins. 
O  sower,  why  dost  thou  abandon  me  ? 

The  Sower.  —  I  do  not  abandon  thee  ;  I  but 
leave  thee  for  a  space.  Soon  we  shall  meet 
again,  thou  multiplied,  I  grateful.  Fructify. 
Wait.  Complain  not.  Do  thy  work.  Thou 
must  needs  be  harvested,  and  I  must  harvest 
thee  ;  I  do  not  abandon  thee. 

II.  The  Man.  —  Sower  of  beings,  why  have 
you  cast  me  away  upon  the  earth,  naked  and 
alone?  Day,  night,  winter,  summer,  I  suffer. 
Do  you  know  that  I  am  unhappy  after  nothing- 
ness, before  heaven  ?  Why  have  you  cast  me 
away  upon  the  earth,  naked  and  alone,  O 
sower  of  beings  ? 


GOD,  RELIGION.  20$ 

God.  —  I  have  not  cast  thee  away ;  I  have 
confided  thee  to  the  fecundating  soil.  Grow 
and  prosper.  At  the  time  of  the  harvest  I  shall 
gather  thee,  and  thou  shalt  be  served  in  thy  fra- 
grance, upon  the  table  of  the  father  of  the 
family.     I  have  not  cast  thee  away. 

LXXXIV. 

The  man  knows  only  how  to  say  "  sorrow  " ; 
the  Christian,  better  informed,  says  "trial." 

Trial !  that  word  explains  man,  evil,  Christi- 
anity, expiation,  heaven,  God. 

LXXXV. 

Repentant  sinners  hasten  to  God.  His  good- 
ness begrudges  nothing  to  his  greatness.  There 
is'  no  fear  that  this  great  King  will  ever  say  to 
you  :    "  I  did  wrong  to  wait." 

LXXXVI. 

The  blue  lake  sleeps  amid  the  green  grass; 
and  the  star  of  heaven,  reflected  in  the  wave, 
forms  the  counterpart  of  the  glow-worm  which 
gleams  upon  the  shore. 

The  meditation  which  envelops  nature  is  so 
profound  that  all  the  sounds  of  evening  can  be 
discerned,  —  the  cry  of  the  cricket,  the  moan  of 
the  frog,  the  murmur  of  the  breeze,  the  whis- 
pering of  the  bird  which  sings  no  more  but  is 
not  yet  asleep  beneath  the  foliage. 


206  THOUGHTS. 

It  is  night,  and  the  air  is  transparent ;  one 
shivers,  and  the  weather  is  mild ;  the  earth 
gives  back  an  echo ;  space  vibrates.  .  .  . 

Solitude  is  peopled ;  silence  speaks. 

I  gaze  upon  the  firmament ;  I  interrogate  the 
earth ;  I  examine  myself  also. 

What  is  the  great  universe  ?  And  I,  what 
am  I  ? 

I  am  a  colonist  of  the  Lord  God  here  below. 

All  that  I  see  and  hear,  near  by,  afar,  beneath 
my  feet,  and  above  my  head,  has  been  created 
by  God  for  me. 

And  that  God,  I  must  love  him,  know  him, 
serve  him.  Thus  shall  I  enter  into  his  joy. 
Fiat! 

LXXXVII. 

O  pagan  philosophers,  your  wisdom  was  a 
beautiful  presentiment.  Jews,  you  knew  "the 
beginning  of  wisdom,  which  is  the  fear  of  the 
Lord."  Wisdom  attains  its  full  growth,  bears 
all  its  flowers,  and  yields  all  its  fruits  only 
through  Christian  love  well  understood  and 
well  practised. 

LXXXVIII. 

Since  neither  good  nor  evil  have  nowadays 
much  vigor,  it  seems  that  God  has  only  wished 
to  give  some  force  to  evil,  which  he  hates,  in 


GOD,   RELIGION.  207 

order  to  give  new  energy  to  the  good  which  he 
loves. 

LXXXIX. 

To  love  to  know  is  human,  to  know  how  to 
love  is  divine. 

xc. 

Godescard  and  his  school  admire  in  their 
Lives  of  the  Saints  only  that  which  the  reason 
of  man  could  accept  of  the  miracles  and  prodi- 
gies. Everything  which  exceeded  the  settled 
limits  was  rejected  under  the  name  of  extrava- 
gance, or  at  least,  of  temerity.  It  was  with  the 
best  faith  in  the  world,  and  for  the  greater 
glory  of  God,  and  the  good  of  the  faithful,  and 
the  honor  of  the  Church,  that  they  said  to  the 
blood  of  Jesus  Christ,  which  was  shed  for  all, 
and  eager  to  extend  to  all,  "Thou  shalt  go 
no  further ! " 

They  were  sincere,  I  repeat,  in  spite  of  so 
much  pride  and  overweening  self-confidence ; 
they  thought  they  knew  men  and  things  a  lit- 
tle better  than  God  himself ;  they  simply  gave 
lessons  in  tact  to  the  Holy  Spirit ;  they  recalled 
the  son  of  Mary  to  respect  for  law,  manners, 
and  usages ;  they  explained  the  Gospel,  they 
made  excuse  for  it  when  necessary ;  they  clip- 
ped the  wings  of  the  angels ;  they  warned  ec- 
statics  to  speak  low,  and  wonder-workers  to  be 


208  THOUGHTS. 

on  their  guard.  The  marvels  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment and  of  the  New  sufficed ;  all  the  rest  was 
compromising  superfluity  and  lacking  in  pro- 
priety. 

Why  were  not  these  good  people,  so  mediocre 
in  mind  and  heart,  contemporaries  of  Jesus 
Christ  ?  They  would  have  besought  him  in  the 
name  of  God,  in  his  own  interest  and  in  ours, 
not  to  be  born  in  a  stable,  and,  above  all,  not  to 
die  upon  a  cross  ! 

xci. 

Admirable  authority  and  fortunate  popularity 
of  the  name  of  God,  which  condemns  to  im- 
potence and  devotes  to  ridicule  every  legislator 
who  undertakes  to  omit  it,  every  writer  who 
endeavors  to  replace  it  by  periphrases ! 

xcn. 

"  .  .  .  Dilexi  nimis."  (Psalms.)  Let  us  love 
too  much,  in  order  to  love  as  God  loves. 

xcni. 
No  joy  is  joy  without  God ;  no  pain  is  pain 
with  God. 

xciv. 

God,  for  a  mass  of  Christians,  is  like  one  of 
those  relatives  whom  we  visit  in  secret,  to  whom 
we  are  gracious  by  stealth,  but  whom  we  blush 


GOD,  RELIGION.  209 

to  meet  in  a  public  place,  or  to  hear  mentioned 
in  a  drawing-room. 

xcv. 

Devotion  is  not  always  piety,  nor  piety  always 
devotion,  nor  virtue  always  sanctity. 

xcvi. 

God  is  a  shower  to  the  heart  burned  up  with 
grief;  God  is  a  sun  to  the  face  deluged  with 
tears. 

XCVII. 

Many  persons  consider  the  Latin  of  the  Imi- 
tation rude  and  heavy.  It  should  be  thought 
simple,  transparent,  and  picturesque. 

The  best  French  translates  it  but  badly,  or 
barely,  or  not  at  all.  Here  are  two  examples, 
two  proofs  of  this  :  — 

Book  II.  chapter  ix.  :  Magnum  est,  et  valde 
magnum,  tarn  humano  quam  divino  posse  carere 
solatio,  et  pro  honore  Dei  libenter  exilium 
cordis  velle  sustinere.1  ...  Is  this  exilium  cordis 
untranslatable?  I  do  not  know,  but  no  inter- 
preter has  thoroughly  understood  it. 

Book  III.   chapter  xxiv.  :    Non  sit  tibi  cures 

1  It  is  a  great  thing,  a  very  great  thing,  to  be  able  to  be 
deprived  of  every  consolation,  both  human  and  divine, 
and  to  be  willing  to  bear  gladly  for  the  love  of  God,  the 
exile  of  the  heart. 


2IO  THOUGHTS. 

de  magnitudinis  umbra  * .  . .  Magnitudinis  um- 
bra !  Herein  lies  a  design  and  an  effect  of 
words  which  Lallemand  and  Gonnelieu  (Lamen- 
nais  was  their  plagiarist)  have  missed. 

And  the  text  of  that  unknown  work  is  full  of 
this  eloquence  and  of  this  poetry. 

XCVIII. 

Mirabeau,  "  the  idol  of  the  people,"  undertook 
to  unchristianize  France ;  Voltaire,  "  the  high 
priest  of  reason,"  dared  to  write,  "  Let  us  crush 
the  infamous  wretch  ! "  Beranger,  "the  singer  of 
liberty,"  strove  to  destroy  both  throne  and  altar ; 
Gambetta,  "  the  defender  of  the  country,"  was 
able  to  exclaim,  "Behold  —  clericalism;  that  is 
the  enemy ! " 

Ye  prophets  who  lie  and  lie,  because  some 
part  of  it  always  remains ;  ye  empirics  who  treat 
the  people  with  poison,  pass  on ;  your  iniquity 
has  missed  its  aim,  pass  quickly,  pass  on ! 

xcix. 
"  Compelle  intrare  ..."  compel  them  to  come 
in.  .  .  .  What  horror  this  saying  has  occasioned  ! 
It  has  been  likened  to  the  Believe  or  die  of  Ma- 
homet ;  to  the  Bible  or  the  fagot  of  Calvin.  .  .  . 
People  have  neither  wished  nor  known  how  to 
understand  the  Word  —  God. 

1  Take  no  care  of  the  shadow  of  greatness. 


GOD,  RELIGION.  211 

Every  great  love  is  tyrannical.  The  good 
master  commands  the  good  servant,  both  for  his 
own  sake  and  for  the  latter's.  The  friend  who, 
being  able,  yet  would  not  force  you  to  be  happy, 
would  be  but  a  sham  friend. 

"  You  must  take  this  remedy !  "  says  the  phy- 
sician to  the  sick  man  whom  he  has  resolved  to 
cure.  "  I  will  have  you  eat !  "  says  the  father 
to  his  son  who  is  no  longer  hungry  and  is  suc- 
cumbing to  debility.  "  I  insist  upon  your  com- 
ing to  my  house,  and  sharing  my  table,  my  fire- 
side, my  bed,"  says  the  charitable  man  to  the 
traveller  who  dares  not  venture.  .  .  . 

You  must,  I  will,  I  insist.  .  .  .  What  is  this,  if 
not  the  Compelle  intrare  of  our  physician,  of  our 
father,  of  our  host  Jesus  ? 

c. 

Let  us  not  fear  giving  pain  to  our  brother 
who  has  gone  astray ;  let  us  recall  him  to  duty 
generously,  delicately.  Our  words  will  cause  in 
his  heart  a  beneficent  trouble,  a  salutary  dis- 
quiet, which  he  will  not,  perhaps,  avow  either  to 
himself  or  to  you  for  the  time  being,  but  which 
he  will  confess  with  gratitude  after  his  return. 

ci. 

The  sculptor  having  thought  out  a  statue, 
first  sketches  in  the  shape  of  a  rough  model, 


212  THOUGHTS. 

then  casts  it   in  bronze,  then  erects   it   on  a 
pedestal.  .  .  . 

Christian,  imitate  the  sculptor;  make  for 
yourself  an  ideal  life,  all  of  terrestrial  trial  now, 
all  of  celestial  glory  in  the  future. 

en. 

The  beggar  knocks  ;  and  in  the  shut-up  house 
a  voice  says,  "  Go  thy  way ;  I  will  not  give ! " 
The  beggar  approaches  another  door,  and 
knocks,  "  Welcome  ;  enter !  " 

O  soul  whom  the  world  repulses,  be  not  dis- 
couraged ;  turn  to  God  ;  He  will  open  to  him 
who  knocks,  and  gives  to  him  who  entreats ! 

cm. 

Bossuet :  Always  greater  than  others,  at  times 
greater  than  himself. 

civ. 

Let  us  pray :  God  is  just,  he  tries  us ;  God  is 
pitiful,  he  will  comfort  us  ;  let  us  pray ! 

cv. 
O  Lord  Jesus !  who  wert  willing  to  take  our 
soul  and  our  flesh,  in  order  to  suffer  like  us, 
with  us,  for  us ;  who  didst  endure  all  anxieties, 
all  bitterness,  all  injustices,  all  ingratitude;  who 
didst  ask  that  the  cup  of  the  Passion  might  be 
taken  from  thee,  and  didst  cry,  "  Eloi !  eloi ! 
Lamma  sabachtani ! . .  . "  Ah !  when  the  com- 


GOD,  RELIGION.  213 

bat  of  life  shall  cause  me  to  complain,  if  men 
have  for  me  neither  pity  nor  excuse,  do  you,  at 
least,  Lord  Jesus,  hear  me,  understand  me,  com- 
fort me,  cheer  me !  .  .  . 

cvi. 

I  declare  that  I  retract  every  passage  in  this 
book  which  would  be,  directly  or  distantly,  incon- 
sistent with  religion  and  morality.  No  thought 
is  avowable  which  is  not  Catholic.  All  which 
did  not  belong  to  the  Roman  Empire  bore  the 
name  of  Barbary ;  all  which  is  not  attached  to 
the  Roman  Church  is  named  Error.  A  philoso- 
pher, however  ingenious  he  may  believe  himself 
to  be,  or  have  the  reputation  of  being,  propa- 
gates darkness,  not  light,  scandal,  not  peace,  if 
he  does  not  teach  like  Peter,  with  Peter.  .  .  . 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

RENEWALS  ONLY— TEL.  NO.  642-3405 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 

Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


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27  1982 


RETD     JUN     3  1982 


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LD21A-60m-6,'69 
(J9096sl0)476-A-32 


General  Library 

University  of  California 

Berkeley 


YB  38700 


